CASE OF IMPEACHMENT OF WASTE. 253 



First, That a timber tree, while it groweth, is merely 

 parcel of the inheritance, as well as the soil itself. 



And, secondly, I will prove, that when either nature, or 

 accident, or the hand of man hath made it transitory, and 

 cut it off from the earth, it cannot change the owner, but 

 the property of it goes where the inheritance was before. 

 And thus much by the rules of the common law. 



And, thirdly, I will show that the statute of Gloucester 

 doth rather corroborate and confirm the property in the 

 lessor than alter it, or transfer it to the lessee. 



And for the second consideration, which is the force of 

 that clause, absque impetitione vasti, I will also uphold and 

 make good three other assertions. 



First, That if that clause should be taken in the sense 

 which the other side would force upon it, that it were a 

 clause repugnant to the estate and void. 



Secondly, That the sense which we conceive and give is 

 natural in respect of the words ; and for the matter agree 

 able to reason and the rules of law. 



And, lastly, That if the interpretation seem ambiguous 

 and doubtful, yet the very mischief itself, and consideration 

 of the commonwealth, ought rather to incline your lord 

 ships judgment to our construction. 



My first assertion therefore is, that a timber tree is a 

 solid parcel of the inheritance ; which may seem a point 

 admitted, and not worth the labouring. But there is such 

 a chain in this case, as that which seemeth most plain, if 

 it is sharply looked into, doth invincibly draw on that 

 which is most doubtful. For if the tree be parcel of the 

 inheritance unsevered, inherent in the reversion, severance 

 will not alien it, nor the clause will not divest it. 



To open, therefore, the nature of an inheritance : sense 

 teach eth there be, of the soil and earth, parts that are 

 raised and eminent, as timber trees, rocks, houses. There 

 be parts that are sunk and depressed, as mines, which are 

 called by some arbores subterraneee, because that as trees 

 have great branches and smaller boughs and twigs, so have 

 they in their region greater and smaller veins ; so if we had 

 in England beds of porcelain, such as they have in China, 

 which porcelain is a kind of a plaster buried in the earth, 

 and by length of time congealed and glazed into that fine 

 substance, this were as an artificial mine, and no doubt 

 part of the inheritance. Then are the ordinary parts, which 

 make the mass of the earth, as stone, gravel, loam, clay, 

 and the like. 



