Lex custumaria, or, A treatise of copy-hold estates in respect of the lord, copy-holder wherein the nature of customs in general, and of particular customs, grants and surrenders, and their constructions and expositions in reference to the thing granted or surrendred, and the uses or limitations of estates are clearly illustrated : admittances, presentments, fines and forfeitures are fully handled, and many quaeries and difficulties by late resolution setled : leases, licences, extinquishments of copy-hold estates, and what statutes extend to copy-hold estates are explained : and also of actions by lord or tenant, and the manner of declaring and pleading, either generally or as to particular customs, with tryal and evidence holder may recieve relief in the Court of Chancery : to which are annexed presidents of conveyances respecting copy-holds, releases, surrenders, grants presentmets, and the like : as also presidents of court rolls, surrenders, admittances, presentments, &c. / by S.C., Barister at Law.

Of Harriots.

HArriots being one of the ancient Services now most esteemed, and kept up, and many Copy-holds being Harriotable, I shall Treat of Harriots, chiefly intending Harriot Customs, and so far of Harriot Services, as to render the whole Intelligible.

The Normans upon parcelling out their Lands to inferior Tenants, invented this Ser∣vice, and termed it Harriot Service; and af∣terwards

upon Infranchisement of their Vil∣lains, Harriot Customs were given to the Lords for a future continued gratulation, and so originally they were de gratia, but now they are de jure.

It is the best Beast (or other thing) that the Tenant hath at the time of his death, and this shall be paid before a Mortuary; but the Lord if he will may seize the worst, and that seizure gives him property, Hob. p. 60.16 H. 7.5. Co. Lit. 185. b.

Harriots may be by Tenure, Custom, or Reservation, Plowd. Com. Redsole and Mantel.

There are two sorts of Harriots, Harriot

• ...Service,
• ...Custom.

And the nature of them both will be best ex∣plained by these diversities.

Harriot Service is generally exprest in a mans Grant or Deed, by which it is reserved, and is in these words, or to this effect, ac etiam per servitium reddendi post mortem cujuslibet tenentis deceden. seisit. optimum animal. &c. 1 An∣derson 298, 299. Odiam and Smith; But Harriot Custom is only due by Custom time out of mind, and may be paid after the death of Tenant for Life, Terms del Ley.

Harriot Service is extinct by Purchase of parcel, but not Harriot Custom, Co. Lit. 149. b.

It hath been made a question in our Books, whether the Lord may seize for Harriot Ser∣vice, but it is agreed he must seize for Harriot Custom, Plowd. 96. a.

In the Case of Woodland against Mantel, it is said the Lord may seize for Harriot Service; but Anderson 1. p. 298, 299. in Odiham and Smith's Case saith, he ought to distrain, and

not to seize; so is Serjeant Benlows p. 18, 39. But the Law is setled in Cro. Car. 260. Mayor versus Brandwood, and that it is at the Lords election either to seize it or distrain it if he can find it, though the pleading seem to justi∣fie it; for in Replevin if one justifie for Har∣riot Custom, its no Plea for the Plaintiff to say, that the place where is hors de son Fee, for that he claims this Harriot as his proper Gopds, and may seize it wherever he finds it, Bendl. p. 18, 39. For the Lord may seize for an Harriot Custom in the High-way, 2 Inst. 132.