Chapter the fourteenth.
Of TITLE by DESCENT.
THE ſeveral gradations and ſtages, requiſite to form a complete title to lands, tenements, and hereditaments, having been briefly ſtated in the preceding chapter, we are next to conſider the ſeveral manners, in which this complete title (and therein principally the right of propriety) may be reciprocally loſt and acquired: whereby the dominion of things real is either continued, or transferred from one man to another. And here we muſt firſt of all obſerve, that (as gain and loſs are terms of relation, and of a reciprocal nature) by whatever method one man gains an eſtate, by that ſame method or it's correlative ſome other man has loſt it. As where the heir acquires by deſcent, the anceſtor has firſt loſt or abandoned the eſtate by his death: where the lord gains land by eſcheat, the eſtate of the tenant is firſt of all loſt by the natural or legal extinction of all his hereditary blood: where a man gains an intereſt by occupancy, the former owner has previouſly relinquiſhed his right of poſſeſſion: where one man claims by preſcription or immemorial uſage, another man has either parted with his right by an antient and now forgotten grant, or has forfeited it by the ſupineneſs or neglect of himſelf and his anceſtors for ages: and ſo, in caſe of forfeiture, the tenant by his own miſbehaviour or neglect has renounced his intereſt in the eſtate; whereupon it devolves to that perſon who by law may take advantage of ſuch default: and, in alienation by common aſſurances, the two conſiderations of loſs and acquiſition are ſo
