Page:William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (3rd ed, 1768, vol I).djvu/210

194 decend lineally to the iue of the reigning monarch; as it did from king John to Richard II, through a regular pedigree of ix lineal generations. As in them, the preference of males to females, and the right of primogeniture among the males, are trictly adhered to. Thus Edward V ucceeded to the crown, in preference to Richard his younger brother and Elizabeth his elder iler. Like them, on failure of the male line, it decends to the iue female; according to the antient Britih cutom remarked by Tacitus, “olent foeminarum ductu bellare, et exum in imperiis non dicernere.” Thus Mary I ucceeded to Edward VI; and the line of Margaret queen of Scots, the daughter of Henry VII, ucceeded on failure of the line of Henry VIII, his on. But, among the females, the crown decends by right of primogeniture to the eldet daughter only and her iue; and not, as in common inheritances, to all the daughters at once; the evident neceity of a ole ucceion to the throne having occaioned the royal law of decents to depart from the common law in this repect: and therefore queen Mary on the death of her brother ucceeded to the crown alone, and not in partnerhip with her iter Elizabeth. Again: the doctrine of repreentation prevails in the decent of the crown, as it does in other inheritances; whereby the lineal decendants of any peron deceaed tand in the ame place as their ancetor, if living, would have done. Thus Richard II ucceeded his grandfather Edward III, in right of his father the black prince; to the excluion of all his uncles, his grandfather’s younger children. Latly, on failure of lineal decendants, the crown goes to the next collateral relations of the late king; provided they are lineally decended from the blood royal, that is, from that royal tock which originally acquired the crown. Thus Henry I ucceeded to William II, John to Richard I, and James I to Elizabeth; being all derived from the conqueror, who was then the only regal tock. But herein there is no objection (as in the cae of common decents) to the ucceion of a brother, an uncle, or other collateral relation, of the half blood; that is, where the relationhip proceeds not from the ame couple of ancetors (which contitutes