chap, iv.] LAWS OF INHEKITANCE. 83 



modified. Formerly any one was competent to found morga- 

 dos, or vinculos, and capellas; if the founder had direct heirs, 

 he could only entail a third part of his property ; otherwise, 

 the whole ; the institutor of an entail was at liberty to fix the 

 order of succession. 



The difference between a morgado, or vinculo, and acapella 

 is, that the latter property was liable to contributions to re- 

 ligious purposes (encargos p>i° s ), such as providing certain 

 masses or alms ; so that, in fact, the life occupant only re 

 ceived a third or a fourth of the income, for his trouble in 

 managing the property: morgado is a term employed to 

 signify either an estate entailed for ever, or its life tenant. 

 Neither morgado or capella property could be alienated. 



In the time of the Marquis of Pombal, two important 

 laws, with reference to this species of property, were passed. 

 The first, dated September 9, 1769, prohibited the found- 

 ing of capellas on real property, reducing the encargos pios to 

 the tenth part of the income of all capellas then in exist- 

 ence ; it further abrogated all those capellas which did not 

 yield the life occupant a net income of £41 13s. Ad. per 

 annum, in the province of Estremadura, or of £20 16s. 8d. 

 in all other parts of the Portuguese dominions : in event of 

 such properties lapsing to the crown, through failure of heirs, 

 the encargos pios were entirely abolished by this law. The 

 law justifies itself in these words: " The charges on proper- 

 ties for masses are already so many, that were all the per- 

 sons, of one and the other sex, in these Idngdoms, priests, 

 they could not perform a third part of the masses required 

 by deeds registered in the will-offices. In one of the small- 

 est of these offices, for example, 12,000 capellas are insti- 

 tuted, and more than 500,000 masses annually required." 



The law passed August 3, 1770, went further, and abo- 



