Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/691

 19. ZANE: THE FIVE AGES 677 supplanted Henry VI., to sue out a general pardon for acts done under the deposed monarch. In 1466 he was made a justice of the Common Pleas, and so remained, even under the short return of Henry VI. He died a judge in 1481. He assisted in fixing the legal landmark of "Taltarum's case, which held that a common recovery suffered by a tenant in tail barred not only the issue in tail, but also any remainder limited thereafter, as well as the reversion in fee. His tomb, in the form of an altar of white marble, still remains in Worcester Cathedral. His will, among other curious be- quests, gallantly provides for prayers to be said for the good of the soul of his wife's first husband. Gentle sarcasm has little in common with the treatise on Tenures ; but it may be that, after an experience with the widow of the de- ceased, Littleton felt that the unfortunate man deserved the prayers. The will shows Littleton to be a pious soul fully persuaded of the efficacy of prayers to prevent the " long tarying " of the soul in purgatory. While Littleton's treatise was put into its final form in the latter part of his life, it is probable that the Tenures is an amplification of his reading on De Donis and represents the collected work of a lifetime. It is a marvel to find a work on the law into which no apparent error has crept. This book has remained the classic treatise on estates, and its words to-day are cited as the undoubted common law. Fol- lowing Fortescue's saying that " from the families of judges often descend nobles and great men of the realm," it may be noted that Littleton's eldest son married one of the co- heiresses of Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, and by right of that descent, Littleton's descendants, who are Vis- counts Cobham, quarter the royal arms of the house of Lan- caster. The descendant of Littleton's second son is Lord Hatherton, while the great-grandson of Littleton's third son was Lord Lyttleton, Lord Keeper under Charles I. An- other descendant was a baron of the Exchequer under Charles II. The traditional portrait of Littleton is unfortunately not authentic. He is shown wearing the collar of SS, still worn by the Lord Chief Justice of England, but absolute