CHAPTER II. NATURE OF ESTATES IN COPYHOLDS. General rules applicable to copyholds and freeholds alike-Reversionary estates-Contingent remainders in copyholds-Undivided estates-Equitable estates-Follow rules of legal estate-Statute of frauds-Constructive trusts-Resulting trustsGeneral rules-Attendant terms-Estates in futuro -Powers of appointment-Springing and shifting uses-Maximum of estate allowed by customs of various manors-Division of copyholds. I. Copyholds of inheritance-Customary fee-simple-Conditional fees-Base fee-Customary entails-Old modes of barring such entails-Fines and Recoveries Act-Mode of disposition-Of legal entail-Of equitable entail-Enrolment on court-roll-Principal provisions of the Act-Who may dispose of entailed estates-Limited dispositions-Disposition by married woman-Office of protector-Period of Enrolment Estates for life-Estate pur auter vie - Occupancy Special occupancy - Descendible freeholds--Quasi-entail--Effect of Wills Act—Chattel interests in copyholds-Lease for a year-Leases - by special custom-Leases by licence-Leases of settled estates-Licences by owners of settled estates -Tenancies at will-By sufferance-By Elegit. II. Copyholds for lives-West of England tenure -Copyholds for lives successively-For joint lives -Other varieties of tenure-Copyholds for lives in Northern Counties-Customs of barring lives in remainder by first taker-What estates to be granted under various customs-Resulting trusts in copyholds for lives-Tenant-right of renewal-Fine certain-Right of nominating successor―Options and preferential claims to renewal-Trustee renewing for his own benefit. III. Copyholds for years -Conventionary estates in Cornwall-General rules as to copyholds for years. BEFORE describing the modes of conveyance which are appropriate to copyholds, it is proposed to treat in this chapter of the different kinds of estate which may subsist in copyhold tenements (a). Copyholds are in general subject to the same rules as those which relate to freeholds in respect of estates in contingency and expectancy, estates held in undivided shares, and equitable estates. But there are in many places special customs as to reversionary estates. in copyholds for lives, which will be noticed later. And as to contingent estates, it should be observed, (a) For an analysis of the different classes of estates which may exist in freehold and copyhold tenements, see Co. Copyh, that inasmuch as the freehold is in the lord and not in the copyholder, a contingent remainder in copyholds was not destroyed (even before the Act 8 & 9 Vict. c. 106.) by the forfeiture, surrender, or merger of the particular estate. ded es As to undivided estates it should be recollected, that Undivi joint tenants hold in a kind of partnership with benefit tates. of survivorship, having a joint title to the whole of the land in one right; tenants in common have each a portion of the land, several though undivided, and claim by separate titles or in separate rights; coparceners on the other hand claim always by one title of descent, and are of an intermediate nature between joint-tenants and tenants in common, having one title but no benefit of survivorship; it follows, that joint-tenants can release but not convey directly to each other, and that tenants in common cannot release, but that coparceners may adopt either method (a). Equitable estates in copyholds "possess in general Equitable all those incidents of the customary property which directly concern the tenant, but not those which are established merely for the benefit of the lord: it being sufficient for the latter to have the person named in the roll for his tenant, without troubling himself to know that he is a trustee." (b). The equitable interest may be modified or subdivided in any way, so long as the custom governing the legal estate is not thereby infringed. But these limits must be (a) Co. Litt. 188 b. (b) Burton. Comp. 1395. estates. Resulting trusts. observed as where, for example, the custom of the manor does not permit entails of the legal estate, a limitation of the trust to a man and the heirs of his body will pass a fee conditional and not an equitable estate-tail. (a). Copyholds are within the provisions of the Statute of Frauds, "that all declarations or creations of trusts or confidences of any lands, tenements or hereditaments, shall be manifested and proved by some writing signed by the party who is by law enabled to declare such trust, or by his last will in writing, or else they shall be utterly void and of none effect." (b). But as in the case of freeholds, there are many constructive trusts of copyhold lands which are not governed by the rule thereby enacted. Such are resulting trusts, terms attendant on the inheritance by implication, and the equities arising from a vendor's lien, a trustee's renewal in his own name, a defective execution of power, the doctrine of election, equitable mortgage, and other equities arising by construction and implication. (c). Of these constructive trusts it is not necessary here to give a detailed account. But the doctrine of resulting trusts is of such importance in some copyhold cases, especially those (a) Pullen v. Middleton, 9 Mod. 483, vide 1 Watk. Copyh. 189, where a contrary opinion was expressed. (b) 29 Car 2, c. 3, ss. 7, 8. Withers v. Withers, Amb. 151. (c) For a succinct account of these constructive trusts, see Burton. Comp. c. 8. s. 3. concerned with copyholds for lives, that it will probably be useful to notice it at greater length. When a copyhold is surrendered to uses which do not exhaust the estate, and there is no evidence of intention to benefit the trustee, a resulting trust will arise in favour of the surrenderor, unless there should be evidence that no such trust was intended, as where the residue of estate is intended to be given up to the lord, or unless by the custom of the manor a surrender without a proper limitation of the uses is construed to give a particular kind of estate. When a copyhold is purchased in the name of one person with the money of another there arises a presumption of the existence of a resulting trust, which can only be upset by showing that an advancement in life was intended for the nominal purchaser, who being a child, or in the place of a child, or wife or bloodrelation of the person who paid the money nominated by him to have the legal estate. If the nominated purchaser stands in one of these relations with the person who finds the money, an advancement will be presumed to have been intended, unless there is evidence of facts contemporaneous or practically forming part of the transaction in question, to show that the nominated purchaser was to hold as a trustee. Upon the same principle, when the purchasemoney is advanced by two persons unequally, a conveyance to the use of them and their heirs will be held to create a tenancy in common in shares is |