CHAPTER I.

OF RENTS IN GENERAL.

1. RENTS are a species of incorporeal hereditament. The word rent, or render, reditus, signifies a compensation or return; it being in the nature of an acknowledgment given for the possession of some corporeal hereditament.-Co. Litt. 144. There are at common law three descriptions of rents: Rent-Service, Rent-Charge, and Rent-Seck.-Litt. § 213. 2 Bl. Comm. 41.

2. Rent-Service is so called because it hath some corporal service incident to it, as, at the least fealty, or the fœdal oath of fidelity. (Co. Litt. 142 a.) For if a tenant holds his land by fealty and ten shillings rent; or by the service of ploughing the lord's land and five shillings rent; these pecuniary rents being connected with personal services, are therefore called rent-service. And for these, in case they be behind, or in arrear at the day appointed, the lord may distrain of common right, without reserving any special power of distress; provided he hath in himself the reversion, or future estate of the lands and tenements, after the lease or particular estate of the lessee or grantee is expired.-Litt. § 215. 2 Bl. Comm. 42.

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3. A Rent-Charge is where the owner of the rent hath no future interest, or reversion expectant in the land; as where a man by deed maketh over to others his whole estate in fee simple, with a certain rent payable thereout, and adds to the deed a covenant or clause of distress, that if the rent be in arrear, or behind, it shall be lawful to distrain for the same. In this case the land is liable to the distress, not of common right, but by virtue of the clause in the deed; and therefore it is called a Rent-Charge, because in this manner the land is charged with a distress for the payment of it.-Co. Litt. 143 b. 2 Bl. Comm. 42.

4. Rent-Seck, or barren rent, is in effect nothing more than a rent reserved by deed without any clause of distress.-Litt. § 218. There are also other names given to rents, but which are reducible to these three kinds.-2 Bl. Comm. 42.

5. These are the general divisions of rent; but the difference between them (in respect to the remedy for recovering them) is now totally abolished; and all persons may have the like remedy by distress for rents seck, &c., as in case of rents reserved upon lease.-4 Geo. II. c. 28. s. 5. 2 Bl. Comm. 43.

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CHAPTER II.

OF THE CREATION AND APPORTIONMENT OF TITHE COMMUTATION RENT-CHARGE.

SECTION I.

Of the Creation of Tithe Commutation Rent-Charge.

6. THE Tithe Commutation Rent-Charge is created under the statutes for the commutation of tithes in England and Wales; being the compensation directed by those statutes to be paid in lieu of tithes. The compensation is properly called a Rent-Charge, the party to whom it is payable having no estate in the land out of which it is payable, but the land being made liable to a distress for the recovery of it under a clause in the statute.

7. It is observable however, that in the case of an ordinary Rent-Charge the owner of the Rent-Charge derives his title to the Rent-Charge out of the title to the lands; but the owner of Tithe Commutation Rent-Charge holds the Rent-Charge under his own. title to the tithes for which the Rent-Charge is substituted, distinct from and independent of the title to the land out of which the Rent-Charge issues.

8. The several Acts of Parliament relating to the Commutation of Tithes are the following:

6 & 7 William IV. cap. 71, entitled, "An Act for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales." Passed 13th August, 1836.

7 William IV. & 1 Victoria, cap. 69, entitled, "An Act to amend an Act for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales." Passed 15th July, 1837.

1 & 2 Victoria, cap. 64, entitled, "An Act to facilitate the Merger of Tithes in Land." Passed 4th August, 1838.

2 & 3 Victoria, cap. 62, entitled, "An Act to explain and amend the Acts for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales." Passed 17th August, 1839.

3 & 4 Victoria, cap. 15, entitled, "An Act further to explain and amend the Acts for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales." Passed 4th June, 1840.

5 & 6 Victoria, cap. 54, entitled, "An Act to amend the Acts for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales, and to continue the officers to be appointed under the said Acts for a time to be limited." Passed 30th July, 1842.

9 & 10 Victoria, cap. 73, entitled, "An Act further to amend the Acts for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales." Passed 26th August, 1846.

10 & 11 Victoria, cap. 104, entitled, "An Act to explain the Acts for the Commutation of Tithes in England and Wales, and to continue the officers appointed under the said Acts until the 1st day of October, 1850, and to the end of the then next Session of Parliament." Passed 22nd July, 1847.