Page:The statutes of Wales (1908).djvu/152

20 which the view shall be had. And at the day given after the view, the deforciant shall make answer who may vouch to warranty by the aid of the Court, as it hath been said in the Writ of Mortdancester; and the Justice shall cause the warrantor to come, as he caused the principal, by one summons, and if it be necessary by a second and a third; at which, if he come not, he being punished upon every default, as is aforesaid, seisin of the thing in question shall be awarded to the demandant for the default of the warrantor; and the deforciant shall have to the value of the land of the warrantor; and the warrantor shall be in mercy. If the warrantor come and freely warrant, he shall be received to answer and defend the plea without having a view of the land; but if he shall deny the warranty, the plea of the warranty shall be carried on between them, after the manner above directed in the Writ of Mortdancester; but if the deforciant except against the demandant, that his ancestor, whose seisin he demandeth, or any one in the descent, were a bastard, so that nothing can descend from him or through him, he shall be heard; or he may shew a deed of feoffment of his ancestor, or of quit claim of any one in the descent: and upon the affirmation of the one party, and the denial of the other, the parties shall descend to the lawful inquest: and by the verdict of the inquest shall the plea be determined, because pleas of land in those parts are not to be determined by battle, nor by the Grand Assize. So if he should except that the ancestor or any one in the descent committed felony, whereby the action lieth not for him; in which case if he to whom this is opposed denieth it, the matter ought rather to be determined by the record of the Justices or of the inquest of the country of the hanging and beheading, and also by the record of the Coroner of the outlawry and abjuration. In like manner on the demand of a tenement that ought to revert after a term passed or by the condition of the gift, upon the affirmation of the one party, and the denial of the other, they shall descend to the inquest of the country, and according to their verdict shall the judgment be.

IX.

Concerning the other article, to wit, of movables, debts and chattels it remaineth to speak; for which there is provided the Writ of debt in the form above written. In this Writ the proceedings shall be after this manner. First, there being found pledges to