Further Land Leo-islation Examined. 251 



<^ 



witli tlie establisliment of Uses. In fact, a struggle lasting 

 over many reigns ensued between the king, backed up by a few 

 great landlords, and the remainder of the landed interest ; the 

 one side endeavouring to destroy, the other side to retain the 

 power of entail. Against the latter Henry VII. introduced 

 the statute of fines for landed property, and limited the benefit 

 of clergy, whereby attainders could be stopped and the inherit- 

 ance saved, to one intervention only ; and Henry VIH., though 

 he sanctioned the demise of real estates by will, endeavoured to 

 destroy the protecting effects of Uses. The practice of the 

 latter custom had revolutionised the old mode of conveyancing 

 with its assurance by feoffment and livery upon the land, 

 which now gave place to secret conveyances to uses, long mort- 

 gage terms, and family settlements. By the end of Henry 

 VIII. 's reign the results of the struggle were palpable in a state 

 of aff'airs very little recognisable from the conditional fees at 

 common law in vogue before the passing of the statute De 

 Bonis. ^ 



This brief summary, it is hoped, will enable the reader to 

 understand the more detailed account to which it is but a 

 preface. 



Taking the various statutes in the order mentioned, we are 

 first confronted with the formidable task ^ of unravelling the 

 process known under the technical term, " Fiction of Common 

 Recovery." ^ It will be more conducive to a thorough under- 

 standing of this method if the reader bears in mind that its 

 object was to bar entails. 



^ Blackstone, Cojnm., Bk. IV., cliap. 33. 



^ Blackstone expressed a fear that he would be unable to make his 

 account of this process clear even to the law students. 



^ A "Recovery" was the legal term for obtaining anything by judgment 

 or trial at law. It was a " Common Recovery," because it was a beaten 

 and common path to the end to which it was appointed, viz. the cutting 

 off of the estates' tail. Finally, it was a fiction or feigned recover^', be- 

 cause the whole proceedings were a pretence brought about by the collu- 

 sion of three parties. These were technically termed (1) the demandant 

 (in reality the recoverer) who brings a friendly writ of entry against 

 (2) the tenant (in reality the recoveree), and (3) the vouchee whom the 

 tenant calls to warranty for the lands in demand.— Jacobs, Laiv Diet., 

 sub voc. " Recovery." 



