6. The chief incidents of the tenure by military acre ice were—Aids,---a pecuniary tribute required by the lord in an emergency, e.g. a ransom for his person if taken prisoner, or money to make his son a knight or to marry his daughter. lieliefa,—the consideration which the lord demanded, upon the death of a vassal for allowing the vassal's heir to succeed to the possession; and connected with this may be mentioned primer aeiain, which was the compensation that the lord demanded for having entered upon the land end protected the possession until the heir appeared to claim it. Fines open alienotion,—a consideration exacted by the lord for giying his consent that the vessel should transfer the estate to another, who should stand in his place in respect to the services owed. Eacheo.—Where on the death of the vassal there was no heir, the land reverted to the lord; also, where the vassal was guilty of treason; for the guilt of the vassal was deemed to taint the blood, uud the lord would no longer recognize him or his heirs. Wardahip and klaritage.—Where the heir was a minor, the lord, as a condition of permitting the estate to de scend to one who could not render military service, assumed the guardianship of the heir, and as such, exercised custody both of his person and of the pro perty, without accounting for the profits, until the heir, if a male, was twenty-one and could under take the military services, or, if a female, until she was of a marriageable age, when en her marriage her husband might render the services. The lord claimed, in virtue of his guardianship, to make a suitable match for his ward, and if wards refused to comply they were mulcted in damages.
7. Feudal tenures were abolished in England by the statute 12r Car. II. c. 24; but the print iples of the system still remain at the foundation of the English and American law of real property. Al
though in many of the states of the United States all lands are held to be allodial, it is the theory of the law that the ultimate right of property is in the state; and in most of the states escheat is regu lated by statute. " The principles of the feudal system are so interwoven with every part of our jurisprqdence," says Ch. J. Tilghman, "that to at tempt to eradicate them would be to destroy the whole." 3 Serg. & R. Penn. 447; 9 id. 333. " Though our property is allodial," says Ch. J. Gibson, "yet feudal tenures may be said to exist among us in their consequences and the qualities which they originally imparted to estates: as, for instance, in precluding every limitation founded on an abey ance of the fee." 3 Watts, Penn. 71; 1 Whart. Plinn. 337 ; 7 Serg. & R. Penn. 188 ; 13 Penn. St. 35.
Many of these incidents are rapidly disappear ing, however, by legislative changes of the law.
S. principles of the feudal law will be found in Littleton's Tenures: Wright's Tenures; 2 Black stone, Comm. c. 5; Dalrymple's Hist. of Feudal Property ; Sullivan's Lectures; Book of Fiefs; Spelman's Treatise of Feuds and Tenures; Cruise's Digest ; Le Grand Coutumier ; the Sabo Laws; the Capitularies ; Les Establisseonents de St. Louis; Asaise de Jerusalem ; Pothier, des Fiefs; Merlin, R5p. Faodolitl; Dalloz, Diet. Feodalite ; Guizot, Email, air l'Iliataire de Franca, Essai 5lme.
The principal original collection of the feudal law of continental Europe is a digest of the twelfth century, Faudorton Conauetudinea, which is the foundation of many of the subsequent compila tions. The American student will perhaps find no more convenient source of information than Blackstone's Commentaries, Sharswood's ed. vol. 2, 43, and Greenleaf's Cruise, Dig. Introd.