Contingent remainders of either kind, if they amount to a freehold, cannot be limited on an eſtate for years, or any other particular eſtate, leſs than a freehold. Thus if land be granted to A for ten years, with remainder in fee to the right heirs of B, this remainder is void[1]: but if granted to A for life, with a like remainder, it is good. For, unleſs the freehold paſſes out of the grantor at the time when the remainder is created, ſuch freehold remainder is void: it cannot paſs out of him, without veſting ſomewhere; and in the caſe of a contingent remainder it muſt veſt in the particular tenant, elſe it can veſt no where: unleſs therefore the eſtate of ſuch particular tenant be of a freehold nature, the freehold cannot veſt in him, and conſequently the remainder is void.
Contingent remainders may be defeated, by deſtroying or determining the particular eſtate upon which they depend, before the contingency happens whereby they become veſted[2]. Therefore when there is tenant for life, with divers remainders in contingency, he may, not only by his death, but by alienation, ſurrender, or other methods, deſtroy and determine his own life-eſtate, before any of thoſe remainders veſt; the conſequence of which is that he utterly defeats them all. As, if there be tenant for life, with remainder to his eldeſt ſon unborn in tail, and the tenant for life, before any ſon is born, ſurrenders his life-eſtate, he by that means defeats the remainder in tail to his ſon: for his ſon not being in eſſe, when the particular eſtate determined, the remainder could not then veſt; and, as it could not veſt then, by the rules before laid down, it never can veſt at all. In theſe caſes therefore it is neceſſary to have truſtees appointed to preſerve the contingent remainders; in whom there is veſted an eſtate in remainder for the life of the tenant for life, to commence when his determines. If therefore his eſtate for life determines otherwiſe than by his death, their eſtate, for the reſidue of his natural life, will then take effect, and become a particu-
