LANDLORD AND TENANT.

A LANDLORD is defined by Lord Coke, in his Definition of Commentaries on Littleton, (a) to be a person of a landlord. whom lands or tenements are holden.

A tenant, according to Kitchen, (b) signifies one a tenant. that holds or possesses lands or tenements by any kind of right, either in fee, for life, or years, or at will.(c)

tion of the

The word fee is applied to all those lands and The applica tenements which are held by perpetual right; and word fee. this estate in fee is commonly divided into fee absolute, otherwise called fee simple,(d) and fee conditional, termed otherwise fee tail.

A TENANT in fee simple is where a man hath lands of an estate or tenements to hold to him and his heirs for ever; (e) infee simple. and such estate is acknowledged to be the highest

and largest that can be in law, or that can be had in real property.

(a) See Co. Lit. 57, 205.

(b) Kitchen, fo. 160.

(e) Every subject of this kingdom that occupieth lands, or inhabits any The meanhouse or tenement, is said to be a teuant, tenens a tenendo, because he ing of the must hold of some lord or other, as lands in England are, since the intro- word tenant. duction of feuds, supposed to be holden mediately or immediately of the king, who is summus dominus supra omnes. 2 Inst. 531.

Of the general ancient tenures; knight's service; chivalry; escuage; petit Ancient serjeantry; also villenage and pillenage, whereby the lord might vassal and tenures enslave his tenant's person at his pleasure, or pillage him of his goods, have abolished. been all taken away by Stat. 12, Car. 2, c. 24. The common tenures at this day are fee simple; fee tail; by the curtsey; in dower; for life; for years; and copy hold tenure. 2 Black. 59.

(d) The student will probably better comprehend the meaning of the The meanword fee, by informing him that an estate in fee means an estate of in- ing of the heritance; and when the word simple is annexed to it, imports an absolute word fee. inheritance, not confined to a particular class of heirs, but descendable to the heirs general of the person last seized, and is used in contradistinction to fees conditional at the common law, or a fee tail by the Statute of Westminster, called de donis.—Lit. s. 1. (see p. 5. post.)

(e) This estate confers on the owner an unlimited power of alienation; Powers conhe may grant any less estate out of it; raise uses on his own seizin, or ferred by an on the seizin of his assignee; create a lease, or determinable fee, or a estate in fee fee tail, or an estate for life, with or without remainders over; he may simple. likewise subject the estate to any condition not repugnant to law, or restrain the tenant's power of alienation over it, within the rules of perpetuity. See Preston, on Abst., v. i., 357-377: v. iii. 221, 222. A

The word

sary in deeds to create a fee simple.

It is in general necessary in deeds that the word heirs neces- heirs be made use of in making a fee simple; but by the recent act of 1st Vic. c. 26, s. 28,(f) for the amendment of the law with respect to wills, it is The word enacted, "that when any real estate shall be debeirs not ne- vised to any person without any words of limitawills made tion, such devise shall be construed to pass the on and sub- fee simple, or other the whole estate or interest 1st January, which the testator had power to dispose of by will 1839. (1 Vic. in such real estate, unless the contrary intention shall appear by the will.”

cessary in

sequently to

c. 26, s. 28.)

The rights

of a tenant

The owner of an estate (g) in fee simple, as a conin fee simple sequence may create every other estate out of it, and as every other estate is included in a fee simple, so will every other estate created out of the same premises, merge therein; in short, this estate confers, on the person entitled in possession, an uncontrolled power(h) and absolute dominion over the hereditaments and premises comprising the subject of such estate. (i)

Of an estate tail.

Tail general

A TENANT in fee tail is where one is seized with limitations to him and the heirs of his body.

It is called tail general (j) when to a man or and special. woman, and the heirs of his or her body; and is called tail special(k) when to a man and his wife, and the heirs of their two bodies, or to a man and the heirs of his body, on a certain woman that he may

Act 1, Vict.

The word estate.

Tail male general.

Tail female general.

(f) This stat. is entitled "An Act for the amending of the Law with respect to Wills," but it does not extend to any will made before the 1st January, 1838. The most apt word that can be found in wills, made before that time, to pass an estate in fee, is the word "heirs; but, other words in such wills, expressive of an intention that the devisee shall hold for ever, or that the estate shall not determine at the devisee's death, nor be confined to issue, will have the same effect. So a devise importing the whole interest, as all my real estate; my tenant right estate; all I am worth; all my property; whatever else I have in the world; and the like will carry the fee.-18 Ves. 193; 11 East, 518; 1 Bro. c c. 437; Cowp. 306.

(g) The word estate signifies the interest which a tenant has in lands or hereditaments.-Co. Lit. 345; 2 Black. 103.

(h) 1 Lil. 541.

i) See Watkins' Prin., chap. 9. and cases there referred to, and see note e to p. 1.

(j) An estate in tail male general is, where lands and tenements are given to a man or woman, and the heirs male of his or her body.

(k) An estate tail female general is, where lands are given to a man and woman, and the heirs female of his or her body.