and the possession is chargeable with the

rent.

It is on this ground, and this ground alone, that the feoffee could at that particular period have been charged with the rent he was liable only in respect of the estates and ownership of the father, not of the estates or ownership of the son, since the son was an infant when he confirmed the grant, and unless the time of the son's estate-tail was annihilated by merger in the estate of the father, the possession was held in right of the son's estate-tail and not of the estate of the father. It follows that, in the supposition that the son's estate-tail conferred a title to a continuing estate, the feoffee or terre-tenant was not chargeable with the rent. short, the right to charge the terre-tenant with the rent in respect of his possession, depended wholly on the point that the time of the son's estate-tail was merged in the time of his father's ultimate reversion in fee.

In

It is also observable in this case that the father and son levied a fine to the use of the father in fee; and that under the declaration of the uses of that

the several estates

fine, the times of all were centered in the person and tenancy of the father. Of his reversion in fee, and the time of his estate-tail, he was

šeised by resulting use, as part of his former ownership, and he became the owner of the several estates of his son by the declaration of the uses of the fine. He therefore took the estates of his son under circumstances, which allowed of their merger. Though the use of the time of all the estates which passed by the fine, was limited to him, by one undivided clause, yet, in effect and construction of law, he became seised of the time of the several estates of himself and of his son; partly by the declaration of uses by his son, and partly under his former ownership; and not in point of law under the ownership of the conusee in the fine. The temporary union of these estates in the conusee, by means of the fine, did not give them any protection from merger; because the instantaneous seisin of the conusee, was immediately severed by the operation of the statute of uses.

The parties derived their ownership under that statute'; and as the statute left to the estates the qualities of the former ownership, it left to them the quality of merger, notwithstanding the uses were to arise from the seisin transferred to the conusee, by a joint conveyance. To this purpose, the conusee is a mere conduitpipe, and the uses arise on the old seisin

of the former owners, rather than the seisin which they transfer to the conusee.

These observations are necessary for the purpose of marking the material points of this case, because they are the only means of distinguishing this determination from those determinations in which the tenants of several distinct estates have joined in conveying these estates to a third for the benefit of that person, person, and he has been considered as holding under the ownership of each person during the time or period of his estate.

The illustration now' given of the doctrine of merger, shews its application to any number of estates. Either each successive estate may be gradually raised in quantity and extent of ownership above the estate next in order of time;or the first or any intermediate estate, may be larger than a more remote estate, and still it will merge, so as the owner of that estate has a more remote interest of larger extent, capable of absorbing the first or any intermediate estate when it becomes in immediate connexion with his estate.

For the operation of the doctrine of merger, as between three or more estates commences with the estate most immediate to the ultimate or remote interest, which

is to be the cause of the merger, and then with the next immediate estate, and so in a retrograde order, precisely in the same manner as if the interme diate estate never had beenlimited. In point of law the more remote estates are absorbed by the doctrine of merger, and effectually determined before the more immediate estates are brought within the influence and application of this learning. The same rule prevails, when there is a mesne estate, larger than the first estate, and also larger than a more remote one, while that, in its turn, is less than the first estate, and the ultimate estate is larger than any of them. The interposed estate will merge in the ultimate estate, and then the prior estate may also merge in that same estate in which the intermediate estates have been annihilated.

CHAP. X.

One of two Estates, will merge in the other, as often as that Estate, if in the Tenancy of a distinct Person, might have been surrendered to the Tenant of the other

Estate.

As a general proposition, merger will take place in all those instances in which two estates meet in the same person, and the owner of one of these estates might surrender to the other, if the two estates were in the tenancy of distinct persons. The instance of two estates of freehold with an intervening estate for years, is perhaps an exception. It seems the

existence of this mesne estate will be an impediment to the effect of a surrender, but it will not altogether prevent the application of merger. The merger, however, will not accelerate the right of possession under the term if it be a vested term.