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APPENDIX.
Conveyances of real property are, in Jersey, termed
contracts. They are prepared on parchment, without
stamp, by the attorneys of the parties, and enrolled in
the royal court, which is called “ passing a contract.
On some court days, fifty or sixty of these, with the
parties concerned, are presented at the royal court.
The expenses attending these contracts are trifling,
and form a great contrast to those in England.
A widow claims as her dower, one-third of the estate
owned by her husband.
A widower enjoys at his wife’s death, if there have
been children, her real estate until he marries again;
but it then reverts to her next of kin, as it does if
there has been no issue.
A wife may reclaim at her husband’s death her estate
if sold or encumbered by him without her sanction
being expressed by a participation in the deed : should
she die first, her heirs have the same privilege.
In bastardy a material distinction exists between the
laws of England and Jersey. Whilst in England they
are for ever under legal disability, in Jersey, the
humane regulation (derived from a Norman custom)
is, that bastards become legitimate offspring in law, if
the parents afterwards intermarry and acknowledge
th em ; and provided that the parties were unmarried
at the birth of such child or children. So that the
innocent children do not suffer for paternal g u ilt; but
it appears an undecided question, whether a son so
previously produced would inherit, in preference to
one born subsequently to the marriage.
It is supposed that there is no part of his majesty’s
dominions, where bigamy is so prevalent as in Jersey
APPENDIX. 339
and in Guernsey; and it can only be accounted for
from the fact, that the civil law as practised in the
islands, does not recognise it as an offence; and even
if it did, it would be only in case both marriages took
place in their own jurisdiction. Bigamists have sufficient
precaution to marry tire second wife or husband,
in a different jurisdiction to the first. For instance, a
person may contract a first marriage in England, or
elsewhere, a second in Guernsey, a third in Jersey,
and a-fourth in France, and vice versa, and in consequence
of each country having separate laws and
independent jurisdiction, put the injured parties at
defiance to obtain redress in either of the two
islands.
A father cannot give, except during his life, a
greater share of his landed property to any one child
than the law specifies. His donation may be annulled
by an action commenced within a year and a day after,
his decease.
All sales of land belonging to minors may be revoked
by them coming of age.
The holders of estates owe homage to the lords of
the manors, and when they are required, are obliged
to deliver into the baronial court an account of the
lands they possess, under the penalty of a seizure of
their property, to be held until the contempt is cleared.
The lords in collateral successions, enjoy the estate of
the deceased for one year.
The undisturbed possession of an estate for forty
years, forms a good and sufficient title.
If an estate is overcharged with mortgages, the
cessio bonorum, or relinquishment of property, is
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