TRUST AND TRUSTEE. A trust, which is in fact a new name given to a use, is defined by Lord Coke in the words employed by him for the definition of a use " A confidence reposed in some other, not issuing out of the land, but as a thing collateral, annexed in privity to the estate of the land, and to the person touching the land, for which cestui que use has no remedy but by subpana in Chancery." (Co. Litt, 272 b.) A trustee is he who undertakes to discharge a trust ; and a cestui que trust, is the person who is entitled to the benefit of a trust.
Owing to the settlements made upon marriage, and the dispositions of property made by will, a great amount of pro perty is in the hands of persons who hold' it in trust for certain purposes defined by the instruments which create the trusts. There are also trusts for charitable pur poses and others. The law relating to
trusts is accordingly implicated with the law of property, and it also contains the rules as to the duties and powers of trus tees, both with reference to the cestuis que trusts and other persons. The Court of Chancery has the sole jurisdiction in trusts.
Trusts may be created either by deed or by testament. The Roman Fidei commissum was only created by testa ment, and it was a testamentary disposi tion by which the testator gave some thing to one person. and imposed on him the duty of transferring it to mother. It is stated that there were no legal means of compelling the discharge of this duty till the time of Augustus, who gave the consuls jurisdiction in Fidel commissa. Under Claudius praetors were appointed to exercise jurisdiction in Fidei com missa.