LAND LAWS. 



521 



match). For a second offense the referee may remove 

 the offending player and compel his side to nnish the 

 match short-handed. 



Any player deliberately striking another, or rais- 

 ing his hand to strike, shall be immediately ruled out 

 of the match. 



Lacrosse has made rapid progress in popu- 

 larity in the United States within the past three 

 years, and especially in the great Universities 

 of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, where it bids 

 fair soon to outrival the game of foot-ball. 

 Lacrosse has nourished the past year in Boston 

 more than in any other American city. In 

 New York it has fully held its own with its 

 rivals of the base-ball and cricket-fields. As 

 yet, however, American lacrosse teams are un- 

 able to compete with the more experienced 

 teams of Canada. 



The lacrosse matches for the several cham- 

 pionships of 1885 resulted in the success of the 

 Montreal Club in winning the lacrosse cham- 

 pionship of Canada, that club's team defeating 

 both the Shamrock Club of Montreal and the 

 Toronto Club, the recognized leading exem- 

 plars of the game in Canada. The lacrosse 

 championship of the United States for 1885 

 was won by the St. Paul's Club of St. Paul. 

 The college championship in lacrosse was won 

 by the Harvard Club's team of Harvard Col- 

 lege, and the championship of the metropolitan 

 district, including New York and Brooklyn, 

 was won by the Metropolitan Club team for 

 1885. In no year has lacrosse gained so much 

 in popularity in the United States as in 1885. 



LAND LAWS* In most of the countries on the 

 Continent of Europe the laws regulating the 

 distribution, transfer, and modes of tenure of 

 land have been greatly changed within the past 

 hundred years. Primogeniture, entails, and 

 settlements have been abolished or greatly re- 

 stricted in their operations; the registration 

 of titles and incumbrances has generally been 

 made compulsory ; cheap and simple methods 

 of transfer have been adopted, and all restric- 

 tions on the sale of land removed ; feudal dues 

 and services have been abolished or commuted ; 

 in many countries large numbers of tenants 

 and laborers have been enabled by the power 

 and credit of the state to purchase their hold- 

 ings, and peasant proprietorship has been ex- 

 tensively introduced ; and, where land is still 

 cultivated by tenants, simple and equitable re- 

 lations, based on contract chiefly, have usually 

 taken the place of the old customary tenures. 

 In several countries the laws compel the dis- 

 tribution of at least a portion of a man's prop- 

 erty among his children. The French Civil 

 Code provides that donations, whether as gifts 

 inter vivos, or testamentary dispositions, shall 

 not exceed one half of the property of the do- 

 nator, or testator, if he leaves on his death one 

 legitimate child ; one third, if he leaves two ; 

 one fourth, if he leaves three or more; and 

 that each child, or its representatives, shall re- 

 ceive an equal share of the remainder. Simi- 

 lar provisions are in force in a number of other 

 countries. In general, the new legislation has 



sought to remove all obstructions in the way 

 of the sale and transfer of land, to increase as 

 much as possible the number of owners of real 

 estate, and to associate the ownership of the 

 soil with its cultivation. Not only have ten- 

 ants and agricultural laborers become owners 

 of land, but large numbers of artisans, shop- 

 keepers, and others have found land a conven- 

 ient and safe investment for their surplus earn- 

 ings. In some places, particularly where the 

 land is used chiefly for raising cereals, subdi- 

 vision has been carried so far as to make the 

 introduction of the best machinery and meth- 

 ods of husbandry impossible, and in some coun- 

 tries statesmen have been making efforts to 

 guard against the evils of excessive subdivision. 

 In Denmark and Mecklenburg-Schwerin sub- 

 division has for some time been impossible or 

 very difficult. While some evils have resulted 

 from the new system, on the whole the masses 

 of the people have derived great social, eco- 

 nomic, and political benefits from this wide 

 distribution among them of the ownership of 

 land and the extensive introduction of peasant 

 proprietorship. They have been made more 

 prosperous, contented, and loyal. 



Great Britain. While these changes have been 

 in progress on the Continent, the laws and cus- 

 toms in England have favored the concentra- 

 tion of the ownership of land among fewer 

 persons; the yoeman farmers, who were quite 

 numerous in the last century, have almost dis- 

 appeared, and many of the large estates have 

 become larger ; very little of the land is cul- 

 tivated by the owners; and it is commonly 

 very difficult, if not impossible, for a tenant 

 to purchase his holding. This tendency to the 

 concentration of ownership is due largely to 

 primogeniture, entails, and settlements ; to the 

 trouble, delay, and cost of investigating titles 

 and making transfers; and to the social and 

 political privileges that large land-owners have 

 enjoyed. Many proposals have been made 

 and a number of laws enacted for the pur- 

 pose of unfettering land and facilitating its 

 sale and transfer, so that it might pass easily 

 into the ownership of those who are best able 

 to develop its utmost capacities for produc- 

 tion, and also for the purpose of giving those, 

 who cultivate the soil greater encouragement 

 to invest money and labor in increasing its 

 productiveness. The recent great depression or 

 the agricultural interests, produced by foreign 

 competition, poor crops, and other causes, has 

 increased the demands for the reform of the 

 land laws. The discussion and legislation on 

 this subject have for many years occupied so 

 much of the attention of English writers and 

 statesmen, the further changes proposed are 

 so extensive, and the interest in them so great, 

 that a general survey of the recent changes and 

 present proposals seems desirable. 



Primogeniture survived the abolition of mili- 

 tary tenures through which it was generally 

 introduced, but since their abolition, owing to 

 the establishment of freedom of testamentary 



