Page:English Historical Review Volume 35.djvu/51

 1920 EARLDOM OF CHESTER 43. and the contrary had never been known. They were as one heir, and one could not sue or be sued without the others. Moreover, the partition among the heirs of Earl Ranulph had been made in such a way that Earl John had the county of Chester for his share by virtue of an ' extent ', and thereby took none of the extraneous lands. Further, Earl John had appeared in litigation concerning his inheritance and answered as a coparcener in virtue of his possession of the county (an admission of his position). For all these reasons, and because de Forz and his wife had shown no sufficient or probable reason for impartibility, the decision was that the county (comitatus) was divisible among the coparceners. The authors of The History of English Law, in pointing out that it was not always for a lord's advantage that he should have but one heir to deal with, say of the Chester decision, ' we cannot believe that Henry III was sorry when his court, after prolonged debate, decided that the palatinate of Chester was divisible among co-heirs ' .1 The consequent increase of the king's revenues by wards, marriages, relief, &c., through the subdivision of a fee, seems to be in the minds of the writers of this passage. It appears to ignore the sequence of significant events which (as we have seen) took place before the verdict, but we can certainly agree that the king's feelings would include no sorrow. Rather would he rejoice. For it will be seen that the decision in favour of partibility left him in an extraordinarily favourable position. He had before, and during, the trial made (recorded) arrangements with all the co-heirs (except de Forz and his wife) whereby he had the right, if he liked, to retain their shares in any partition which might be ordered of the Cheshire inheritance, giving them other lands elsewhere in exchange, and also on such terms that if the decision had been the other way he would have suffered no loss, but would have been entitled to reclaim his manors on the grounds that there was nothing to exchange. In view of the settled state of the law of descent to coparceners, the only doubt which one would think could have arisen in the Chester case was, whether its palatine character affected its divisibiUty, and it seems likely that the king and his advisors did not think much of the point and had speculated on a decision in favour of partition. However this may be, the king had only de Forz left to deal with. The latter's position was not a strong one. He was, as all agreed, entitled to the dignity of earl of Chester, but the decision left him, if not that impossibility in those days, a landless earl of Chester,^ at any rate one shorn of the greater part of the » 2nd edition, ii. 265. had livery of the lands in September 1241 (Cai. of Pat. Rolls and Excerpta e Rot. Fin.).
 * He succeeded his father in 1241 as count of Aumale and lord of Holdemess, and