110 COURT OF CHANCERY MAY AUTHORISE LEASES. LETTER XVI. WHERE powers beneficial to all persons who could claim under a settlement were not contained in the deed or will strictly settling the estate, Parliament was in the habit, but with great caution, of supplying the omission; but now, to save the expense and delay of resorting to the Legislature, provisions have been made* which ought to be known by every owner of a settled estate in the kingdom. The provisions apply to Ireland as well as to England. You must be content with an outline of them. The Court of Chancery is empowered from time to time to authorise leases of the whole or any part of any settled estates, or of any rights over or affecting them for any purpose whatsoever, whether involving waste or not, upon the conditions imposed by the Act-viz., Every lease is to take effect in possession or within 1 year, and for terms not exceeding 21 years for an agricultural or occupation lease. 99 years for a building-lease, or, in this instance, if The best rent, without a fine, is to be reserved halfyearly, or oftener, with special provisions as to minerals and the interests therein of remainder-men. The lease is not to authorise the felling of trees except where necessary for the buildings or works authorised by the lease. * 19 & 20 Vict., c. 120. POWER TO LEASE FOR TWENTY-ONE YEARS. 111 The lease is to be by deed, and the lessee is to execute a counterpart; and there is to be a condition for re-entry if the rent is 28 days in arrear, and such other covenants as the Court shall direct. The Court may authorise preliminary contracts, and the terms may be varied in the leases. The lessees may surrender the leases, and new leases may be granted of the property surrendered. The Court is to direct who are to be the lessors. The Act then provides by whom application may be made to the Court, and with whose consent, with other important provisions; but most of these provisions apply equally to sales under the Act, to which I shall call your attention in my next Letter, and I do not therefore add them here. I will affix an asterisk to such of them as refer to leases, and thus put you in possession whilst I avoid a repetition of them.* You should keep this in mind. The Act, then, provides that every person in possession of any settled estate for his life, or years determinable with his life, or for any greater interest in his own right or in right of his wife (unless there is an express declaration to the contrary in the settlement), and also any person entitled in possession to any unsettled estate as tenant by the curtesy, or in dower, or in right of a wife seised in fee, without any application to the Court of Chancery [pray observe this] may lease the estate (except the principal mansion and the demesnes and lands usually occupied with it) for 21 years; but this power only extends to settlements made after the 1st of November 1856. The lease under this last power must be made to take effect in possession and by deed, and at rack-rent without a fine, which rent will go with the estate. The lessee must *Turn to p. 120. 112 COURT OF CHANCERY MAY AUTHORISE LEASES. not be made dispunishable of waste, and the lease must contain a covenant to pay the rent, and such other usual and proper covenants as the lessor shall think fit, and a right of re-entry on non-payment for 28 days of the rent, and on non-observance of any of the covenants in the lease. A counterpart of the lease is to be executed by the lessee, but the execution of the lease by the lessor is made evidence that a counterpart of it has been duly executed by the lessee. There are two important powers in the statute-one relates exclusively to leases, the other is general—which may properly find their place in this Letter. I. The Court is authorised, where it shall be deemed expedient, to vest any general powers of leasing any settled estates either in the existing trustees of the settlement or in any other persons, and may impose any con ditions as to consents or otherwise on the exercise of such powers, and may also authorise the insertion of provisions for the appointment of new trustees for the purpose of exercising such powers of leasing. II. The Court, with a due regard to the interests of all parties, may direct that any part of any settled estate be laid out for streets, roads, paths, squares, gardens, or other open spaces, sewers, drains, or water-courses, either to be dedicated to the public or not, and the Court may direct the parts so laid out to remain vested in the trustees, or to be vested in any other trustees, and with provisions for the appointment of new trustees, as shall be deemed advisable. I may now mention to you that rents received upon a lease by a tenant for life, or granted under a power, and all other rents becoming due at fixed periods under SHORT FORMS OF LEASES. 113 any instrument, are, upon the death of any person interested in such rents, or on the determination by any other means of his interest, made apportionable in favour of such person or his personal representatives, unless it shall be expressly stipulated that no apportionment shall take place.* The Act of Parliament upon which this apportionment depends is not free from ambiguity, but its operation has been confined in the manner I have mentioned. I shall conclude this Letter by informing you that there is an Act of Parliament which, if you express your lease to be made in pursuance of it, enables you to adopt a few words to which an extended meaning is given by the Act the object was to facilitate the granting of leases by shortening of them, but like its twin brother, an Act for Shortening Conveyances,‡ it has not, I believe, been resorted to in practice. * 4 & 5 Will. IV., c. 22. + 8 & 9 Vict., c. 124. 8 & 9 Vict., c. 119. H 114 AGREEMENT FOR A SETTLEMENT: FRAUD. LETTER XVII. THE subject for the present Letter is the Settlement of your Estates, and Personal Property. I may premise that the Statute of Frauds, to which I have so often referred you, requires agreements made upon consideration of marriage to be in writing, and signed by the party to be charged therewith, or his agent. A letter, however, is considered a sufficient agreement, if it contain the terms, and amount to an offer. In one case a man wrote a letter, signifying his assent to the marriage of his daughter, and that he would give her £1500; and afterwards, by another letter, upon a further treaty concerning the marriage, he receded from the proposals of his letter. And at some time afterwards he declared that he would agree to what was propounded in his first letter. It was held that this letter was a sufficient promise in writing; and that the last declaration had set up again the terms in the first letter. Reliance, however, should never be placed on a mere letter. Equity will, in some cases, relieve a party on the ground of fraud, although there is not a valid agreement. A man of the name of Halfpenny, upon a treaty for the marriage of his daughter, signed a writing, comprising the terms of the agreement; and afterwards designing to elude the force of it, and get loose from his agreement, ordered his daughter to put on a good humour, and get the intended husband to deliver up the |