THE LAW AND CUSTOM OF PRIMOGENITURE 397 



intestacy, would probably effect a considerable though gradual 

 revolution in the English land system, even though not supple- 

 mented by any other enactment. 



Such is the object of Mr. Locke King's original bill " for 

 the better settling the real estates of intestates," introduced in the 

 session of 1859, and re-introduced by Mr. T. B. Potter, in the 

 present session (1876). This bill provides that where any per- 

 son beneficially entitled to any real estate shall die without a 

 will, that estate shall pass to his executor or administrator, and 

 shall be either divided or sold, exactly as if it were personalty, 

 for the benefit of creditors and the next of kin. A " real-estate 

 succession bill " of the same general character was introduced 

 by the government in the session of 1870, but that bill, unlike 

 Mr. Locke King's, was intended to cover legal, as well as equi- 

 table, or beneficial, estates, while it included various saving 

 clauses more or less open to criticism. A third bill, introduced 

 by Mr. Locke King and Mr. Hinde Palmer in the session of 

 1873, after providing against certain technical difficulties, em- 

 braced within its definition of real estate every kind of property 

 which is not personal estate. Not one of these bills, however, 

 goes the length of vesting in the executor realty passing by 

 devise, in the same manner as personalty, including leaseholds, 

 passing by bequest, vests in the executor under the existing law. 

 Nor does any provide that real estate passing by descent or de- 

 vise shall cease to be exempted from the probate duty imposed 

 on personalty. Still less does any interfere with the rule under 

 which a person succeeding to real estate, though he may inherit 

 in fee-simple, is charged with succession duty on his life interest 

 only, and is permitted to pay this duty by instalments a rule 

 which amounts to a legislative protection of landed property 

 against a salutary liability to dispersion. 



A far more serious and difficult issue arises upon the various 

 proposals for amending the existing law of entail and settlement. 

 These proposals usually assume one of two general forms, widely 

 differing, in principle, from each other. Either they contemplate 

 a reconstruction of our land system on the model of the Code 

 Napoleon, or they are directed to a simple . restriction of the 



