This, I ſay, was the only inſtance; for I think there can be no other caſe deviſed, wherein there is not ſome owner of the land appointed by the law. In the caſe of a ſole corporation, as a parſon of a church, when he dies or reſigns, though there is no actual owner of the land till a ſucceſſor be appointed, yet there is a legal, potential ownerſhip, ſubſiſting in contemplation of law; and when the ſucceſſor is appointed, his appointment ſhall have a retroſpect and relation backwards, ſo as to entitle him to all the profits from the inſtant that the vacancy commenced. And, in all other inſtances, when the tenant dies inteſtate, and no other owner of the lands is to be found in the common courſe of deſcents, there the law veſts an ownerſhip in the king, or in the ſubordinate lord of the fee, by eſcheat.
So alſo in ſome caſes, where the laws of other nations give a right by occupancy, as in lands newly created, by the riſing of an iſland in a river, or by the alluvion or dereliction of the ſea; in theſe inſtances the law of England aſſigns them an immediate owner. For Bracton tells us[1], that if an iſland ariſe in the middle of a river, it belongs in common to thoſe who have lands on each ſide thereof; but if it be nearer to one bank than the other, it belongs only to him who is proprietor of the neareſt ſhore: which is agreeable to, and probably copied from, the civil law[2]. Yet this ſeems only to be reaſonable, where the foil of the river is equally divided between the owners of the oppoſite ſhores: for if the whole ſoil is the freehold of any one man, as it muſt be whenever a ſeveral fiſhery is claimed[3], there it ſeems juſt (and ſo, is the uſual practice) that the eyotts or little iſlands, ariſing in any part of the river, ſhall be the property of him who owneth the piſcary and the ſoil. However, in caſe a new iſland riſe in the ſea, though the civil law gives it to the firſt occupant[4], yet ours gives it to the king[5]. And as to lands gained from the ſea, either by allu-
