over-mortgaged, the last mortgagee can only recover by taking to the estate on payment of the debts.

Should the last mortgagee refuse, the estate is offered on the same terms to the last but one, and so on till it finds a proprietor. Undisturbed possession during thirty years is a good title.

Lands sold for money can be claimed by the lord of the manor, or even by the nearest relations of the seller, on payment of the purchase money.

Personal property beyond one-third of the estate can only be willed by those who have neither wife nor children.

Natives and strangers are alike liable to arrest in the islands for debt, the pursuer having the right to prevent the debtor's departure from the island. The creditor may seize either body or chattels, but not both, nor can money about the person be seized.

For debts contracted out of the islands, arrest is permitted on evidence properly authenticated either by the creditor actually following the debtor in person or by giving a power of attorney to an islander.

In Jersey, arrest may take place without proof or affidavit, and unless the bail offered be accepted, imprisonment will follow.

Encroachments on property are sometimes met by a very peculiar exclamatory appeal, called "Ha! Ro!" repeated thrice. It is considered to be the remains of an old appeal to Rollo, Duke of Normandy, and is followed by action. If the encroachment is proved, a fine is imposed, and no islander would venture to resist this curious form of injunction which has been made, in some cases, within a few years of the present time.

In Jersey, game is followed by every one at pleasure; but actions for trespass lie against those who wilfully trespass. In Guernsey, there is, practically, no law on the subject. During winter, on fine days, the fields and roads are dangerous on account of the continued popping from guns in the hands of boys

and men.

Accidents are frequent, but no check is thought of. Trespassing is practically considered lawful; and though there are means of punishing offenders, they are rarely, or never, put in force..

The peculiar nature of the island customs with regard to the rights of real property are such that no one should purchase land in the islands, or even lease a house for more than three years, without sound professional advice. All parts of the property of a vendor are jointly and severally liable for all debts charged upon the whole, or any part, so that it may happen that, after a piece of land is purchased and a house erected on it, the purchaser may be deprived of his property because the vendor subsequently becomes bankrupt, and the other parts of the vendor's estate will not discharge the debts secured on it. So also in the event of a lease being granted, if the lessee should afterwards become insolvent, the creditors can dispossess the tenant notwithstanding the covenant of the lease. All this arises from the feudal manner of regarding real property as being held by the owner in trust for society and the lord, rather than as absolutely his own, to be dealt with as he pleases.

In Jersey, land is held in various ways, either as farms on lease paying annual rent, or as freehold; but the lease is limited to nine years, and the freeholds are subject, in many cases, to an annual payment, representing the interest of part of the purchase money left unpaid, and therefore a kind of mortgage debt. This is sometimes a number of quarters of wheat, and varies with the price of that article. The quarter of wheat is estimated generally at £20, and the annual payment on the quarter is then twenty shillings. Obligations of this kind are commonly bought and sold under the denomination of "rents ;" and the mode of tenure, though complicated and apparently inconvenient, is not without certain local advantages. In Guernsey, the land is rarely leased, owing to the difficulty of binding the legal heirs of an estate to agree to the lease in the event of the

death of the actual lessor. "Rents" are payable either in money, at a rate per quarter, fixed each year, or in kind. Capons and fowls are also valued, being payable under certain contingencies.

The descent of landed property is governed by different laws in Jersey and Guernsey. In the former island, on the death of a proprietor, the eldest son takes the house and about two acres of land adjoining, with one-tenth of the real property, including rents. The remainder is shared,-two-thirds among sons, and one-third among daughters; but in no case can a daughter take more than a son, the sons, when the number of daughters is disproportionately small, being able to insist on equal division.

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In Guernsey, the eldest son inherits only about one-sixth of an acre of land with the house. He is, indeed, at liberty to keep possession of all land to which he can have access without crossing the public road; but, for this, he must pay to his co-heirs a price assessed generally at more than he can afford to pay.

The person and goods of a stranger are exempt from arrest, in either of the islands, until he has resided there a year and a day. But this exemption only applies to simple contract debts incurred out of the island.

It is one of the most important privileges of the Channel Islands that, in all cases where the matter in dispute occurs within the island, the causes should be heard and adjudicated there, subject only to appeal to the sovereign in council. This is sometimes a great hardship to strangers. Even the act of habeas corpus has only lately been registered in the islands, and, in very recent times, has been successfully resisted. The law cannot be said to be settled with regard to this important privilege of Englishmen. It must, however, be added that the principle and practice of this act are closely interwoven into the island laws.

In ecclesiastical matters, both islands are now placed under the Bishop of Winchester. Each has a Dean, whose powers are vague and very limited; and for a long time after the Reformation, there was little episcopal or other ecclesiastical superintendence over the rectors. The advowsons, although now all in the gift of the crown, belonged originally to certain religious houses in France, and were only taken occasionally into the king's hands in time of war. They were annexed to the crown on the suppression of the alien priories in the time of Henry V.

Originally, of course, subject to the head of the Roman Catholic Church, the Reformed Church in the Channel Islands

assumed the more severe and extreme phases of Puritanism; and both in Jersey and Guernsey, but especially the latter, the Presbyterian form and discipline introduced during the reign of Queen Elizabeth has influenced the feelings and habits of the people even to the present day.*

In each of the larger islands the dean is one of the rectors; but as the emoluments are extremely small, and the duties also trifling, this can hardly be regarded as a plurality. No other plurality is admitted. The livings are small, but the objects of much anxious inquiry when a vacancy occurs. Of late years several district churches, in which the English service alone is performed, have been added in the town parishes both of St. Helier's and St. Peter's Port. In the country parishes the French language is generally retained; but at least one English service on each Sunday has lately become a common custom.

The rectors in both islands have seats in the legislature. There is an Ecclesiastical Court in Guernsey, consisting of the Dean as president, the Rectors of the island, the Queen's Procureur, and four other Advocates, who are Proctors, a Registrar, and an Apparitor or Beadle. The Ecclesiastical Court in Jersey consists of the Deant as Judge, and eleven Rectors as assessors, a Proctor, a Greffier, an Advocate, and an Apparitor.

This is seen in many ways, not only in the multitude of sects, but in the frequent prayer meetings, extra services on week-days, both at churches and school-rooms, and branch meetings of various religious societies. These are resorted to, very generally, by all denominations, and in some of the most important services of the church there is a marked indifference to the ordinary forms of the establishment elsewhere. It is strange to see the principal cemetery of the town parish in Guernsey unprovided with a chapel, and still more strange to find that funerals are there hurried over entirely in the open air, the officiating minister being without a surplice, and a large and most touching part of the ceremony entirely omitted.

+ At present the parishes of the Forest and Torteval in Guernsey are held together, but it is understood that they will be separated when a vacancy occurs.

Technically, the bishop's commissary is the president in Jersey, but the dean is also commissary.