When property is offered for sale or mortgage, a " search " generally forms part of the titles offered for inspection to the parties treating for it. This is a certificate by the proper officer, describing all registered documents regarding that particular piece of land which have been recorded during forty years. It is remarkable that the enlightened mind of Cromwell appears to have comprehended the utility of this system, and that he made an effort to introduce it into England. We are told by Ludlow (Memoirs, I., p. 436), " In the meantime the reformation of the Law went on but slowly, it being the interest of the lawyers to preserve the lives, liberties, and estates of the whole nation in their own hands, so that upon the debate of registering deeds in each county, for want of which, within a certain time fixed after the sales, such sales should be void, and being so registered that land should not be subject to any luennibrance, this word incumbrance was so managed by the lawyers that it took up three months' time before it could be ascertained by the committee." Registration for Execution is another peculiarity of the law of Scotland, although the system of warrants to confess judgment in England iu some measure resembles it. The party to a solemn deed
incorporates with it a clause of registration, by which, on the deed being registered in the books of a court competent to put the deed in force, the decision of the court shall be held as pronounced in terms of the deed, and execution may proceed against the party on an extract, as if it were the decree of a court. The engagement on which such execution may issue must be very distinctly net forth. Thus, if it be for payment of money, it must be for a sum named in the deed, and not for the balance that may be due on an account arising out of the transactions to which the deed refers. This method of execution was by statute (1681, c. 20) made applicable to bills and promissory notes without their containing any clause of registration. To entitle it to this privilege, the bill or note must be apparently without flaw, must bear the appearance of due negotiation, and must have been protested. The operation of this system was much widened by the Act 1 & 2 Viet. c. 114, which extended registration for execution to the Sheriff Courts.