affecting a stability which human providence can never attain to.'-2 Swanst. 460. See PERPETUITY.

The prospective accumulation of income of real or personal estate is restrained by 39 & 40 Geo. III. c. 98. This statute is sometimes quoted as Lord Loughborough's Act, but it is more commonly called The Thellusson Act,' because the case of Thellusson v. Woodford (4 Ves. 227-343, 1798; and 11 les. 112-151, 1805) was the occasion of its enactment. It declares that no person shall by deed, will, or otherwise howsoever, dispose of any real or personal property, in such manner that the rents, or produce thereof, shall be accumulated for any longer term than

(1) The life of the grantor; or

(2) The term of twenty-one years from the death of the grantor; or

(3) During the minority of any person who shall be living or en ventre sa mère at the time of the death of the grantor; or

(4) During the minority of any person who under the trusts of the deed, will, or other assurance, directing such accumulations, would, for the time being, if of full age, be entitled to the rents, or annual produce so directed to be accumulated. 'In every case where any accumulation shall be directed otherwise than as aforesaid,' provides the statute, 'such direction shall be null and void; and the rents, issues, profits, and produce of such property so directed to be accumulated, shall, so long as the same shall be directed to be accumulated contrary to the provisions of this act, go to and be received by such person or persons as would have been entitled thereto if such accumulation had not been directed' (s. 1).

The act, however, does not extend(1) To any provision for payment of debts of the grantor, or other persons; or

(2) To any provision for raising portions for any child of the grantor, or any child of any person taking any interest under the grant; or

(3) To any direction touching the produce of timber or wood upon any lands or tenements (s. 2).

(4) To any disposition respecting heritable property in Scotland.

The statute operates as a restraint upon those trusts for accumulation which aim at a duration beyond the statutory limits, simply by causing them to cease and become of no effect immediately upon the twentyfirst anniversary of the death of the settlor or testator, and until that date, leaves them as valid as if the act had not passed.

Accumulative Judgment. If a person al

Accusare nemo se debet, nisi coram Deo.Hard. 139.-(No one is bound to accuse himself, unless in the presence of God.)

Accusation, the formal charging of any person with a crime.

Accusator post rationabile tempus non est audiendus, nisi se bene de omissione excusaverit. See Sir. A. Ashley's case, Moore, 817.

(An accuser ought not to be heard after the expiration of a reasonable time, unless he can account satisfactorily for the delay.) Acemannes-ceaster, Bath.

Acephali, the levellers in the reign of Hen. I., who acknowledged no head or superior.-Leges H. 1; Cowel. Also certain ancient heretics who appeared about the beginning of the 6th century, and asserted that there was but one substance in Christ, and one nature.

Ac etiam [and also]. The introduction to the statement of the real cause of action in cases where it was necessary to allege a fictitious cause in order to give the Court jurisdiction. Bouvier. The ac etiam clause appears to have been invented in consequence of the enactment of 13 Car. s. 1, c. 2, that the particular cause of action must be expressed in the writ where more than 407. was claimed.-Davison v. Frost, 2 East, 305. See also LATITAT. Achat [Fr.],

Cowel.

a purchase or bargain.

Achators, or Achetors, purveyors, because they frequently bargain; also purchasers.— Chaucer.

Achelanda, Auchelandia, Auchelandia, Auklandia, Auckland, in the Bishopric of Durham. Acherset, a measure of corn, conjectured to have been the same with our quarter or eight bushels.-Cowel.

Achwre [Ach-guré, near belt], an enclosure of wattles or thorns surrounding a building, at such a distance as to prevent cattle reaching and damaging the thatch.-Anc. Inst. Wales.

Acknowledgment-money, a sum paid in some parts of England by copyhold-tenants on the death of their lords, as a recognition of their new lords, in like manner as money is usually paid on the attornment of tenants. --Cowel.

Acknowledgment of a wife's assurance. A declaration by her that she knows what the assurance means, and that she executes it of her own free will, for making which certain formalities are prescribed by the 'Fines and Recoveries Abolition Act' (3 & 4

Wm. IV. c. 74), ss. 77-91, with regard to land, and by 20 & 21 Vict. c. 57, commonly called Malins's Act,' which incorporated the procedure of the Fines and Recoveries Act, with regard to reversionary interests in personal estate.

The Fines and Recoveries Act required the acknowledgment to be made before two commissioners, but the 7th section of the Conveyancing Act, 1882, has substituted one only, and has also dispensed with an affidavit and certificate of acknowledgment required by the former act. See the Rules

under the Act of 1882, in Sweet's Concise Precedents, at p. 22. They provide that the commissioner must not be interested in the matter either as solicitor or party, and must examine the wife, separately from her husband and the solicitor concerned in the transaction, whether she intends to give up her interest, etc. The Act of 1882 applies only to deeds executed after its commencement. No married woman, however, by virtue of the Married Women's Property Act, 1882, need acknowledge a deed conveying property accrued to her after 1882; and woman married after that date need acknowledge any deed at all. See Sweet, p. 17.

no

Acknowledgment of debt or liability. See LIMITATIONS, STATUTE of.

Aclea [fr. ac, an oak, and leag, place, Sax.], a field where oaks grow.-Cunningham.

Acolyte [fr. akaλóvtos, Gk.], one of the minor orders in the Romish Church, whose office it is, next under the sub-deacon, to follow or wait on the priests or deacons in the ministry of the altar, and perform the meaner offices of lighting the candles, carrying the bread and wine, etc. This officer was in our old English called a colet, from which the family of Dean Colet, the founder of St. Paul's school, derived its name.--Cowel.

A communi observantia non est recedendum; et minimè mutanda sunt quæ certam interpretationem habent. Co. Litt. 365.—(From common usage there should not be any departure, and things which have an ascertained meaning are to be the least changed.)

Acquest or Acquit, property obtained by purchase or donation.-Encyc. Lond.; Civil Law.

Acquiescence, consent, either express or implied.

Acquietandis Plegiis, an obsolete writ, lying for a surety against the creditor who refuses to acquit him after the debt is satisfied.

Acquietantia de shiris et hundredis, freedom from suits and services in shires and hundreds.-Cowel.

Acquisition, the act of procuring property. Acquitave [fr. quietum reddere, Lat.], to acquit, absolve.-Blount.

Acquittal [fr. acquitter, Fr. ; quietus, Lat., to free, acquit, or discharge], a deliverance. and setting free of a person from the suspicion or guilt of an offence; also to be free from entries and molestations by a superior lord, for services issuing out of lands.Cowel. Acquittal is of two kinds—(1) Acquittal in deed, as when a person is cleared by verdict; and (2) Acquittal in law, as if two be indicted for a felony, the one as principal and the other as accessory, and the jury acquit the principal, by law the accessory is also acquitted.-2 Inst. 384.

Acquittal contracts, a discharge from an obligation, which is either by deed, prescription, or tenure.-Co. Litt. 100 a.

Acquittance, a release or written discharge of a sum of money or debt due as where a man is bound to pay money on a bond, rent reserved upon a lease, etc., and the party to whom it is due, on receipt thereof, gives a writing under his hand witnessing that he is paid, this will be such a discharge in Law that he cannot demand and recover the sum or duty again, if the acquittance be produced.-Termes de la Ley, 15.

Acre [fr. aypos, Gr.; ager, Lat.; akrs, Goth.; acker, Germ.], a measure of land. The extent of the acre was first defined by statute in the 33 Edw. I., according to which an acre contains 169 square perches, the then perch being 5 yards. The imperial or standard English acre contains four roods, each rood forty poles or perches, each pole 272 square feet, and consequently each acre = 43,560 square feet.-See Weights and Measures Act, 1878. The French acre, arpent, contains 1 English acres, or 54,450 square English feet. The Welsh acre contains commonly two English acres. Irish acre is equal to 1 acre, 2 roods, and 19 perches English; the Scotch, 6,150% square yards.

The

Act in Pais [Pais, Law Fr., country], a thing done out of court, and not a matter of record.-2 Bl. Com. 294.

Act of Attainder. See BILL OF ATTAIN

DER.

Act of Bankruptcy, an act, the commission of which by a debtor renders him liable to be adjudged a bankrupt; under the Bankruptcy Act, 1883, any one of the following acts:

(a) Having made an assignment of his property in trust for his creditors generally.

(b) Having made a fraudulent conveyance, gift, delivery, or transfer of his property, or of any part thereof.

(c) Having made a conveyance amounting to a “fraudulent preference."

(d) Having, with intent to defeat or delay his creditors, departed out of England, or being out of England, remained out of England; or having absented himself; or begun to keep house.

(e) Having suffered execution on his goods.

(ƒ) Having filed, in the Bankruptcy Court, a declaration admitting his inability to pay his debts or having presented a bankruptcy petition against himself.

(g) Having neglected to pay or secure a judgment debt after service of a "bankruptcy notice."

(h) Having given notice to any creditor of suspension of payment.

where an act expires before a bill continuing it has received the royal assent, the latter act takes effect from the expiration of the former, unless otherwise provided, and except as to any penalty (48 Geo. III. c. 106); (2) it is to be construed according to the intent and object with which it was made, and not according to the mere letter; (3) that these points be considered-the old law, the mischief, and the remedy; (4) remedial statutes are to be more liberally, and penal more strictly, construed; (5) in construing a statute, all other statutes made in pari matriâ, ought to be taken into consideration; (6) a statute which treats of things and persons of an inferior rank, cannot by any general words be extended to those of a superior; (7) where the provision of a statute is general,

Act of Curatory, the order by which a curator, or guardian, is appointed by the Court.-Scotch Law.

a

Act of God. Defined by a Court of Appeal in Nugent v. Smith, 1 C. P. D. 423, as direct, violent, sudden, and irresistible act of nature, which could not, by any reasonable cause, have been foreseen or resisted.'

Act of Grace. The act so termed in Scotland was passed in 1696; it provides for the maintenance of debtors imprisoned by their creditors. It is usually applied in England to insolvent acts, and to general pardons granted at the beginning of a new reign, or on other great occasions.-Encyc. Lond.; Bell's Dict.

Act of Oblivion, 12 Chas. II. c. 11.

Act of Parliament, a law made by the Sovereign, with the advice and consent of the lords spiritual and temporal, and the commons, in parliament assembled (Bl.); also called a 'statute.'

Acts of parliament are either (1) public; (2) local or special; or (3) private or personal. Public acts are those which affect the whole realm or important parts of it. Local, etc., acts concern particular localities, as railway or gas and water acts. Private

acts concern individuals and families only, as acts naturalising a party, dissolving a marriage, or settling particular estates. By 13 & 14 Vict. c. 21, s. 7, every act made after the commencement of the then next session of parliament, is to be taken to be a public one, and judicially noticed as such, unless the contrary be expressly declared.

The principal rules for the interpretation of acts of parliament are the following:-(1) a statute begins to operate from the time when it receives the royal assent, unless otherwise provided (33 Geo. III. c. 13). But

provision effectual is supplied by the Common Law; (8) a subsequent statute may repeal a prior one, not only expressly, but by implication, as when it is contrary thereto, i.e., so clearly repugnant that it necessarily implies a negative, but if the acts can stand together, they shall have a concurrent efficacy; (9) if a statute, repealing another, is itself repealed, the repealed statute does not revive without express words (13 Vict. c. 21, ss. 5 & 6); and (10) acts of parliament cannot derogate from the power of subsequent parliaments.

Statutes are variously cited; many of the old statutes are called after the name of the place where the parliament which passed them was held, as the Statute of Merton, or Marlebridge, or Winchester, or Westminster; others are denominated entirely from their subject, as the Fines and Recoveries Act, the Non-arrest Act; some are distinguished from their initial words, as the statute Quia emptores or De donis; some are commonly called after the member of parliament who introduced them, e.g., as Lord Campbell's Act (6 & 7 Vict. c. 96), Russell Gurney's Act. But since the time of Edward II. they are generally cited by naming the years of the sovereign's reign during which the session of parliament was held in which the statute was passed, together with the chapter or particular act, according to its numerical order, e.g., 3 & 4 Wm. IV. c. 74, the chapter, if the act be a local and personal one, being printed in Roman figures, e.g., 20 & 21 Vict. c. xciv. About the year 1850 'short titles' began to be introduced, with the date, e.g., the Common Law Procedure Act, 1852; the Merchant Shipping Act, 1854, etc.; and this useful nomenclature is now almost universal. All the acts of a session together make properly but one

statute, and therefore, when two sessions have been held in one year, it is usual to mention stat. 1 or 2. Thus the Bill of Rights is cited as 1 W. & M. st. 2, c. 2.— Consult Bac. Abr. Statutes; Dwarris on Statutes; Maxwell on Statutes, 2nd ed. ; Hardcastle on Statutes; Wilberforce on Statutes; and Chitty's Statutes, vol. i., tit.Act of Parliament.'

By 13 & 14 Vict. c. 21,‘An Act for shortening the language used in Acts of Parliament,' it is provided inter alia that words importing the masculine gender shall include females, that the singular shall include the plural, the plural the singular, that month' shall mean calendar month, and ‘land' shall include messuages, tenements, and hereditaments, houses, buildings of any tenure, unless in each case the contrary is expressly provided.

Of late years many steps have been taken by the Government with a view to classifying and consolidating the Statute Law. Various 'Statute Law Revision Acts' have been passed, by which a vast number of obsolete and unnecessary acts and portions of acts have been repealed. See for instance 19 & 20 Vict. c. 64; 24 & 25 Vict. c. 101; 26 & 27 Vict. c. 125; 30 & 31 Vict. c. 59; 33 & 34 Vict. c. 69; 34 & 35 Vict. c. 116; 35 & 36 Vict. cc. 63, 97, 98; 36 & 37 Vict. c. 91; 37 & 38 Vict. cc. 35, 96; 38 & 39 Vict. c. 66; and 51 Vict. c. 3. Moreover numerous consolidation acts have been passed since the work of revision was first commenced. Amongst these may be mentioned the National Debt Act, 1870, the Public Health Act, 1875, the Friendly Societies Act, 1875, the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, the Weights and Measures Act, 1878, the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, the Coroner's Act, 1887, and the Sheriff's Act, 1887.

The first volume of the revised edition of the statutes was published in 1870. It contains all the acts or portions of acts remaining unrepealed down to the reign of James II., and has been followed by later volumes. A Chronological Table and Index to the Statutes is also published annually.

Act of Settlement, 12 & 13 Wm. III. c. 2, limiting the crown to the Princess Sophia of Hanover, and to the heirs of her body being Protestants.

Act of Uniformity, the 13 & 14 Car. II. c. 11, which, by section 4, enacted that the Book of Common Prayer, then recently revised, should be used in every parish church and other places of public worship. An important amendment has been made of this Act by the 35 & 36 Vict. c. 35, which inter alia provides a shortened form of Morning

and Evening Prayer.' The 34 & 35 Vict. c. 37 amends the law relating to the Tables of Lessons and Psalter contained in the Prayer Book, and introduces a new and revised Table of Lessons. See further PUBLIC WORSHIP REGULATION ACT.

Acta exteriora indicant interiora secreta. 8 Co. 146.--(External acts indicate undisclosed thoughts.)

Actaindre le meffait [Fr.], to fix the charge of a crime upon one, to prove a crime.Carp. Wedgw.

Actio ad exhibendum, an action for the purpose of compelling a defendant to exhibit a thing or title in his power. It was preparatory to another action, which was always a real action in the sense of the Roman Law, that is, for the recovery of a thing, whether it was movable or immovable.Nerl. Quest de Dr. tome i. 84. Civil Law.

Actio bonæ fidei, an action which the judge decided according to Equity, the judex thus acting as arbiter with a wide discretion. -Sand. Just., 7th ed., 326, 429.

Actio commodati contraria, an action by a borrower against a lender, to enforce the execution of a contract.-Poth. Prêt. à Usage, n. 75. Civil Law.

Actio condictio indebiti, an action for the recovery of a sum of money or other thing paid by mistake.-Poth. Promutuum, n. 140. Civil Law.

Actio ex conducto, an action by a bailor of a thing for hire, against a bailee, to compel him to deliver the thing hired.--Poth. Du Contr. de Louage, n. 59. Civil Law.

Actio contra defunctum cæpta continuitur in hæredes. An action begun against a person who dies is continued against his heirs.) This rule does not apply to actions strictly personal.-See Lansdowne v. Lansdowne, 1 Mad. 16; and see infra, ACTIO PERSONALIS.

Actio depositi contraria, an action which a depositary has against a depositor, to compel him to fulfil his engagement towards him. Poth. Du Dépôt. n. 60. Civil Law.

Actio depositi directa, an action by a depositor against a depositary, in order to get back the thing deposited.-Poth. Du Dépôt. n. 60. Civil Law.

Actio judicati, an action after four months had elapsed from the rendition of judgment, in which the judge issued his warrant to seize, first, the movables, which were sold within eight days afterwards, and then the immovables, which were delivered in pledge to the creditors, or put under the care of a curator, and, if at the end of two months the debt was not paid, the land was sold.-Dig. 42, t. 1; Code, 8, 34; Civil Law. Actio non accrevit infra sex annos, the

name of the plea of the Statute of Limitations, when the defendant alleges that the plaintiff's action has not accrued within six years. See LIMITATIONS, STATUTE OF.

Actio non datur non damnificato. Jenk. Cent. 69.-(An action is not given to him who is not injured.)

Actio personalis moritur cum persona.-(A personal action dies with the person.)- As if battery be done to a man, if he who did the battery or the other die, the action is gone'-Noy, 9th ed., p. 20. This rule of the Common Law has been encroached upon by various statutes: by 4 Edw. III. c. 7, and 3 & 4 Wm. IV. c. 42, s. 2, as to trespass; and by 9 & 10 Vict. c. 93 (Lord Campbell's Act), as to negligence causing death.

Actio poenalis in hæredem non datur, nisi forte ex damno locupletior hæres factus sit.(A penal action is not given against an heir, unless, indeed, such heir is benefited by the wrong.)

Actio pro socio, an action by which either partner could compel his co-partners to perform their social contract.-Poth. Contr. de Société, n. 134. Civil Law.

Actio quælibet it suâ viâ. Jenk. Cent. 77. -(Every action proceeds in its own way.) Action, conduct, something done; also the form prescribed by Law for the recovery of one's due, or the lawful demand of one's right. Bracton defines it:-Actio nihili aliud est quam jus prosequendi in judicio quod alicui debetur.-(An action is nothing else than the right of prosecuting to judgment that which is due to any one.) Actions are divided into criminal and civil: criminal actions are more properly called prosecutions, and perhaps, actions penal, to recover some penalty under statute, are properly criminal actions. Actions civil are divided into three classes :-(1) real, which concerns real property only, as the action of dower; (2) personal, such as concerns contracts, both sealed and unsealed, and offences or trespasses; and (since the Jud. Acts, 1873 and 1875) probates and administrations: the first are called ex contractu-they are debt, promises, covenant, account, detinue, revivor, and scire facias; the second are ex delicto, as case, trover, replevin, and trespass vi et armis; (3) mixed, which lie as well for the recovery of the thing as for damages for the wrong sustained, as ejectment. By 3 & 4 Wm. IV. c. 27, s. 36, real actions were abolished, except actions of writ of right of dower, dower, quare impedit, and ejectment. By 23 & 24 Vict. c. 126, s. 26, the first three of these were entirely abolished, and it was provided that where any of them would have lain, an ordinary action might

be commenced in the Court of Common Pleas.

The term 'action' is now applied to all proceedings in the Supreme Court which would have been commenced by writ in the Superior Courts of Common Law, the Court of Common Pleas at Lancaster, and the Court of Pleas at Durham; and all suits formerly commenced by bill or information in the Court of Chancery or by a cause in the Court of Admiralty, or in the Court of Probate (Jud. Act, 1873, s. 100, and R. S. C. 1883, Ord. I., r. 1).

Also stock in a company, or shares in a corporation.-Fr. Comm. Law.

Action for poinding of the ground, so called to distinguish it from personal poinding, and can therefore be only against the goods belonging to the debtor. Every person who has a debt secured upon land, or as it is commonly expressed, a debitum fundi, whether the security be constituted by law or by paction, is entitled to an action for poinding all the goods on the lands burdened, even though the original debtor on the lands burdened should have been divested of the property in favour of third persons.-Scotch Law.

Action of a writ, a phrase used when a defendant pleads some matter by which he shows that the plaintiff had no cause to have the writ sued upon, although it may be that he is entitled to another writ or action for the same matter.-Cowel.

Action of abstracted multures, an action for multures or tolls against those who are thirled to a mill, i.e., bound to grind their corn at a certain mill, and fail to do so.Bell's Dict.

Action of adherence, an action competent to a husband or wife, to compel either party to adhere in case of desertion.- -Scotch Law. It is analogous to the English suit for restitution of conjugal rights.

Action on the case. See CASE.

Action prejudicial, otherwise called preparatory or principal, an action arising from some preliminary doubt, as in case a man sue his younger brother for lands descended from the father, and it is objected against him that he is a bastard, this point of bastardy must be tried before the cause can proceed. It is, therefore, termed præjudicialis.-Sand. Just., 7th ed., 439.

Action redhibitory, an action instituted to avoid a sale on account of some vice or defect in the thing sold, which renders it either absolutely useless, or its use so inconvenient and imperfect, that it must be supposed the buyer would not have purchased it had he known of the vice.-Civil Law.