property so disposable, is controlled by statute.

After a

will is made, it is common for the testator to add to the original will certain modifications of it. These must be reduced to writing, and be attested in like manner as the original will. Such modifications are called codicils.

§ 404. Revocation of wills.-A will may be revoked in several ways. The making of a new will revokes all prior wills. The testator may revoke his will by mutilating or destroying it with the intent to revoke it, or such mutilation or destruction may be done by any one at the request of the testator. The subsequent sale of land devised by a will revokes the will as to that land. The testator may revoke the will by a writing, subscribed and attested like a will, in which his intention to revoke it is clearly expressed. A will is sometimes revoked by operation of law, as when a child, unprovided for in the will, is subsequently born.

Wills relating to land must be executed and attested according to the forms required by the law of the place where the land lies. Wills disposing of personal property must be executed according to the laws of the place where the testator resided at the time of his death. The provisions of wills executed and proved in a foreign country or another state may be enforced wherever property is found belonging to the testator, and disposed of by the will, upon producing and placing of record a copy of the will and a duly certified copy of the proceedings by which the will was admitted to probate. The methods of proving and enforcing the provisions of such wills are regulated by statute.

A will may be set aside in a suit brought for that purpose by any party in interest, when it is proved that the will was unduly executed, that its execution was pro

cured by fraud or duress, or that the testator did not possess the legal capacity to make a will.

§ 405. Title by purchase. The cumbersome methods of transferring title to real estate which were customary under the common law of England have never prevailed in this country, though in some localities there are useless intricacies and mysteries. Since real estate has become a commodity, and has lost in public estimation much of that fictitious dignity with which it was clothed by the common law, the forms of buying and selling and conveying it have been much simplified. Title bonds, quitclaim and warranty deeds are about the only instruments necessary to carry out the intention of the parties. A title bond is an agreement signed by the seller agreeing to convey to the buyer, for a stipulated price to be paid, certain land described in the instrument. A quitclaim deed is a form of conveyance in which the grantor conveys to the grantee, his heirs and assigns, all the grantor's present interest in land. A warranty deed is a form of conveyance by which the grantor conveys land to the grantée, his heirs and assigns, with an agreement expressed in 'the deed that the grantor will warrant and defend the title against all persons, and against all incumbrances. The form may be varied when the warranty is not general, but special, and where certain incumbrances are assumed by the grantee. By special clauses incorporated in the deed the exact meaning of the parties as to what interest is conveyed and what liens are assumed may be expressed. To make a deed effective to pass title, it must be executed in due form and be delivered to the grantee, or to some one for him. To make the delivery effective the grantor must relinquish all control over the instrument. If, after it is executed, it is put in the hands of a third person, to be by him

delivered upon the performance of some act or the happening of some contingency, the instrument is, until the act is performed or the contingency happens, an escrow and not a deed.

§ 406. Title bond.-The title bond, as we have seen, is a sale of land with an agreement to convey. It must be in writing because by the statute of frauds no action can be maintained on an agreement for the sale of lands or any interest therein, unless the agreement, or some memorandum thereof, is in writing, and signed by the person to be charged thereby, or by some one authorized to sign it for him. Such a bond only gives an equitable estate, even where the purchase-money is all paid, but a court of equity upon proof of payment will compel the seller to make a deed according to his agreement, and the same relief will be given against the heirs of the seller.

§ 407. Deeds by owners not in possession.—At common law the conveyance of land, which at the time of the conveyance was in the adverse possession of another, was void, but this rule of the common law has been abrogated by the laws of many states, although in some of them it is still recognized. The reason for the rule was that the right to make such conveyances tended to encourage litigation, and because, as Coke says, "under color thereof pretended titles might be granted to great men, whereby right might be trodden down and the weak oppressed." Conveyances of land pending suit involving the title thereto are void, except in states where by statutory enactment they are recognized as valid.

§ 408. Forms of deeds.-What form is necessary and what formalities in its execution are requisite to give

validity to a deed, depend upon the statutes of the state where the land lies.

§ 409. Registration of deeds.—A deed after its execution and delivery should be recorded promptly. A delay in recording it beyond the time fixed by statute will make the deed void as to subsequent purchasers in good faith without notice of the existence of the unrecorded deed. All sales of interests in land, except leases for short terms specified by statute, must be in writing and should be recorded. To entitle such instruments to be recorded, they must be acknowledged before some officer authorized to take such acknowledgment.

§ 410. Parties to deeds.-The parties to a deed, especially the grantors, must be capable under the law of making such contracts. If it is intended to convey the interest of the husband and to bar the wife's right of dower, she must join in the deed with her husband, and under the laws of some of the states she must be examined by the officer taking the acknowledgment, separate and apart from her husband, to see that her uniting in the deed is her free and voluntary act. A husband may execute a valid conveyance of his lands without his wife joining in the deed, but the grantee takes subject to the wife's right of dower, and if she survives her husband, she can have her dower assigned to her out of the land. A wife's deed of her own land, without her husband joining, is, in most states, void.

§ 411. Deeds by officers.-Sheriffs, master commissioners and others appointed by the court, in making deeds should strictly pursue the statute and the decrees of the court authorizing the conveyance. A sheriff's deed executed according to law need not be submitted to the

court for its approval, but commissioners, guardians, executors and others who make what are called judicial sales, should report them to the court with a form of conveyance for the approval of the court. Lands are conveyed by auditors or other officers where they have been sold for delinquent taxes. Titles acquired by means of tax sales are, if not regarded with suspicion, carefully scrutinized, and any irregularity in the levy of taxes or sale will vitiate the deed.

§ 412. Description of land conveyed. The land should be so described in a deed or agreement for sale that a stranger, without the aid of outside evidence, can go upon the premises and identify it. In states where the public lands have been surveyed in sections and sectional subdivisions, it is sufficient to describe the land as being section No. -, township —, range, in

county and state. Where the land is described by metes and bounds the lines, courses, corners and distances should be accurately followed.

§ 413. Title by eminent domain.-All private ownership of land is held subject to the state in which it lies, and there resides in the state the power to resume possession and ownership of it, whenever the public good requires it. This power has its limits fixed by the Constitutions of the United States and of the several states, which provide that private property shall not be taken for public use without just compensation. Where it is desired to appropriate land for the purpose of establishing navy yards, arsenals, or for sites for post office buildings, custom-houses and the like, the government, if it can not secure desirable property by purchase, institutes by its proper officers proceedings in the proper courts within whose jurisdiction the land lies, to have the value of the