A Dictionary of Law

Descent; in the descent. See ForMEDON.

Hereditary succession. Succession to the ownership of an estate by inheritanee, or by any act of law, as distinguisheil from “purchase.” Title by descent is the title by which one

The devolving of —— realty upon the heir on the death of his aneestor intestate,

Lat. DeeS scription of the person. By this is meanta word or phrase used merely for the purpose of identifying or pointing out the person intended, and not as an intimation that th

1. A delineation or account of a particular subject by the recital of its characteristic accidents and qualities. 2. A written enumeration of items composing an estate, or of its c

To leave or quit with an intention to cause a permanent separation; to forsake utterly; to abandon.

The act by which a seaman deserts and abandons a ship or vessel, in which he had engaged to perform a voyage, before the expiration of his time, and without leave. By desertion, in

In Spanish law. Dishonor; injury; slander. Las Puartidas, pt. 7, tit. 9, 1. 1, 6.

In the law of evidence. Purposs or intention, combined with plan, or implying a plan in the mind. Burrill, Cire. Ey. 3dl. As a term of art, the giving of a visible form to the conc

A description or deseriptive expression by which a person or thing is denoted in a will without using the names

The de scription of a person or a parly to a deed or coutract, Designatio unius est oxclusio alterius, et expressum facit cessare tacitum. Co. Litt. 210. he specifying of one is th

Thisterm, used ina will in relation to the management and distribution of property, is guilicient to create a trust, ale though it is precatory rather than imperative. 7% iy. 128.

A term used in the Spanish law, denoting the act by which the boundaries of an estate or portion of a country are determined.

In Spanish law. Persons deprived of memory. Whiltv, New Recop. b. 1, tit. 2, ¢. 1, § 4.

Fr. Of his own wrong. <A stranger who takes upon him to acl as an executor without any just authority is called an “executor of his own wrong,” (de son tort.) 2 Bl. Comm. 507; 2 St

Of his own wrong. The law Freneh equivalent of the Latin phrase de injuria, (q. v.)

In marilime law. Persons appointed to settle cases of averugea.

Official communications of official persons on the uifairs of govern. ment,

Hopeless; worthless, This term is used in inventories and schedules of assets, particularly by executors, etc., to deseribe debts or claims which are considered impossible or hopel

Contempt. Despitz, contempts. Kelham.

Contempt. See DESPITE. A contemptible person. Fleta, lib.4, e. 5.

This word involves, in its signification, violence or clandestine means by which one is deprived of that which he possesses. Its Spanish equivalent, despojar, is a term used in Mex

A possessory action of the Mexican law. It is brought to recover possession of inimovable property, of which one las been despoiled (despojado) by another. The word “despoil” (desp

The act of betrothing persons to each other.

In Spanish law. Espousals; mutual promises of future marriage. White, New Recop. b. 1, tit. 6, c. 1, § 1.

This word, in its original and most simple acceptation, signifies master and supreme lord; it is synonymous with monarch; but taken in bad part, as it is usually employed, it signi

That abuse of government where the sovereign power is not divided, but united in the hands of a single man, whatever may be his official title. It is not, properly, a form of gover

In French law. When a person is declared bankrupt, he is immediately deprived of the enjoyment and administration of all his property; this dep- Tivation, which extends to all his

The writ of statute merchant. Reg. Orig. 146).

In Romanlaw. One of the innominate contracts, and, in effect, a sule of land or goods at a price fixed, (a@séimato,) and guarantied by some third party, who undertook to find a pur

‘The purpose to which legacy when he prescribes the specific use to which it shall be put. The port at which a ship is to end her voyage is called her “port of destination.” Pardes

To weary a person with continual barkings, and then to lite; spoken of dogs. Leg Alured. 26, cited in Cunning. ham’s Dict.

Disuse; cessation or dis- ‘continuance of use. Applied to obsolete E statutes.

Of showing the tablets of a will. Dig. 43, 5. DE TALLAGIO NON CONCEDEDR- DO. Of not allowing talliage. The name given to the statutes 25 and 384 Edw. I., re stricting the power of

To seize or take into custody another’s goods or person.

This term is used in policies of marine insurance, in the clause relating to “arrests, restraints, and detainments.” The last two words are construed as equivalents, each meaning t

Inold English law. A park or place fenced in for deer, and defended asa property and peculiar fur that use and service, Cowell.

The act of keeping back or withholding, either accidentally or by design, a person or thing. See DETAINER. DETENTION IN A REFORMA-

That which may cease or determine upon the happening of a certain contingency. 2 Bl. Comm. 121.

(Also called a “qualified” or “base” fee.) One which has a qualification subjoined to it, and which must be determined whenever the qualilication annexed to itis atan end. 2BI.Comm

Estates for life, which may determine upon future contingencies before the life for which they are created expires. As if an estate be granted to a woman during her widowhood, or t

That which is ascertained; what is particularly designated.

The decision of a court of justice. The ending or expiration of an estate or interest in property, or of a right, power, or authority.

Tocometoanend. To bring toanend, 2 Bl. Comm, 121; 1 Washb. Real Prop. 380. presence of witnesses, (denuntiatio facta cum testutione.) Dig. 50, 16, 40.

Of testaments. The title of the fifth part of the Digests or Pandects; comprising the twenty-eighth to the thirty-sixth books, both inclusive.

A writ which lay for a person who was prevented from taking toll, Reg. Orig. 103.

In practice. A form of action which lies for the recovery, in specie, of personal chattels from one who acquired possession of them lawfully, but retains it without right, together

In pleading. An action of replevin is said to be in the detinuzt when the plaintiff acquires possession of the property claimed by means of the writ. ‘The right to retain is, of co

To be torn in pieces by horses. Fleta, 1. 1, ¢. 37.

A writ of trespass. Reg. Orig. 92.

deed de una parte is one where only one party grants, gives, or binds himself to do a thing to another. It differs from a deod infer partes, {g.v.) 2 Bouv. Inst. no. 2001.

pl. DEUNCHS. Lat. In the Roman law. A. division of the as, containing eleven uncie or duodecimal parts; the proportion of eleven-twelfths. 2 Bl. Comm, 462, note. See As. Deus solus

The wet, or condition, of one who marries a wife after the death of a former wife.

A writ which lay where a man’s wife had been ravished and carried away. <A species of writ of trespass. Reg. Orig. 97; Fitzh. Nat. Brev. 89, O; 3 Bl. Comm. 139.

or DIVADIATUS. An offender without sureties or pledges. Cowell.

Wasteful use of the property of a deceased person, as for extravavant funeral or other unnecessary expenses. 2 Bl, Comm. 508.

They have wasted. A term applied in old English law to wiste by executors and administrators, and to the process issued ayainst them therefor. Cowell. see Devas Tavit.

Lat. He has wasted. The act of an executor or administrator in wasting the goods of the deceased; mismanagement of the estate by which a loss occurs; a breach of trust or misapprop

Writ of waste. A writ which might be brought by him who had the immediate estate of inheritance in reversion or remainder, against the tenant for life, in dower, by curtesy, or for

A writ, now obsolete, directed to the king's escheators when any of the king’s tenants ii eapite dies, and when his son and heir dies within age and in the king’s eustody, commandi

A writ to inspect the body, where a woman feigns to be pregnant, to see whether she is with child. It lies for the heir presumptive to examine a widow suspected to be feigning preg

Word for word. Braet, fol. 1388. Literally, from word to word. DE VERBORUM SIGNIFICA-

Writ _ of (or for) removing lay force. A writ which lay where two parsons contended for a church, and one of them entered into it with a great number of Zaymen, and held out the ot

Capable of being devised. l Pow. Dey. 165; 2 Bl. Comm, 373.

In practice. The name of an issue sent out of a court of chancery, or one which exercises chancery jurisdiction, to a court of law, to try the validity of a paper asserted and deni

A gift of real property by will. Devise properly relates to the disposal of real property, not of personal. 21 Barb. 551, 561. Devise is properly applied to gifts of real preperty

The person to whom lands or other real property are devised or given by will. 1 Pow. Dev. ec. 7.

A giverof lands or real estate by will; the maker of a will of lands; a testator.

Fr. Duty. It is used in the statute of 2 Rich. I. ¢. 3, in the sense of duties or customs.

In ecclesiastical law. The forfeiture of a right or power (as the right of presentation to a living) in consequence of its non-user by the person holding it, or of some other aet o

“To devolve means to pass from a person dying to a person living; the etymology of the word shows its meaning.”

In English law. A person who, being an alien born, has obtained, ex donatione reyis, letters patent to make him an English subject,—a high and incoismn- @nicable branch of the roya

Lat. In Roman law. A division of the as, consisting of ten uncie; ten-twelfths, or five-sixths. 2 Bl. Comm. 462, note m.

One at the right hand of another.

To shake hands in token of friendship; or to give up oneself to the power of another person.

A sort of lynch law, ya person was first punished and then tried. Wharton. Iz. To aubsist; to exist; to be susable; to be proper or available. Thus phrase “an action will not Jie”

cleatly directed to the sheriffs of London, commianding them, in cases where a wril of error was brought by a defendant against whom a judgment was reevvered, to see that his goods

A writ for the enforce ment of aright of way. Reg. Orig. 155,

For dividing athing heldincommon. The name of an action given by the civil law. Mackeld. Rom. Law, § 499.

From to day day. Bract. fol. 2058, DE DIVERSIS REGULIS JURIS

Inthe civillaw. An accusulion or information.

In English ecclesiastical law. ‘The taking away from a clergyman his benefice or other spiritual proinotion or diguity, either by sentence declaratory in the proper court for fit a

In Mevyican law. The desamoriizacion of property is to take it out of morbmain, (dead hands;) that is, to unlouse it from the grasp, as it were, of ecclesiastical or civil corporat

The office of a deacon.

A deacon.

A medical term, meaning the discovery of the source of a patient’s Il ness.

That branch of logic which teaches the rules and modes of reasoning.

A rhetorical figure in which arguments are placed in varions points of view, and then turned to one point. Ene. Lond.

Dialogue of or about the exchequer. An ancient treatise on the court of exchequer, attributed by some to Gervase of Tilbury, by others to Richard Fitz Nigel, bishop of London in th

A logical reasoning in a progressive manner, proceeding from one subject to another, Ene. Lond.

Daily food, or as much as will suffice for the day. Du Cange.

In old English law. A tally for accounts, by number of cuts, (taéllees,) marks, or notches. Cowell. See TALitia,

Days in court on ich the laws are administered.

Inimaritimelaw. The contract which takes place vetween the owner of a ship, the captain, and the mariners, who agree that the voyage shall be for the benelit of all, The term is us

To order or instruct what is to be said or written. To pronounce, word by word, what is meant te be written by another. 6 Mart. (N. 5.) 143.

In Louisiana, this term is used in a technical sense, and means te pronounce orally what is destined to be written at the same time by another. It is used in reference to nuncupati

A magistrate invested with unlimited power, and created in times of national distress and peril. Among the Romans, he continued in office for six months only, and had unlimited pow

Arbitrators,

In general. A statement, remark, or observation. Gratis dictum; a gratuitous or voluntary representation; one which a party is not bound to make. 2 Kent, Comm. 486. Simplex dictum;

The edict or declaration of Kenilworth An edict or award between King Henry IIT. and all the barons and others who had been in arms against him; and so called because if was made a