CHAP. I.
When, at last, both the litigating Parties are present in Court, and the Demandant has proceeded to claim the Tenement in question, the Tenant may pray a View of the Land.
But, with respect to the time which should be allowed him for this purpose, a distinction is to be made, whether the Tenant has more land in the Vill, where the Land in question is situated, or not. In the latter case, no delay shall be conceded him: but, if he has more Land in the Vill, further time shall be allowed him, and another day given him to appear in Court.[83] If he then depart from Court, he may again avail himself of three reasonable Essoins, and the Sheriff of the County, where the Lands in question are situated, shall be directed to send free men of his County to view the Land, by the following Writ:
CHAP. II.
“The King, to the Sheriff, Health. I command you that, without delay, you send free and lawful men of the neighbourhood[84] of such a Vill, to view one Hyde of Land in such a Vill, which M. claims against R. and of which there is a suit between them in my Court; and have four of them before me, or my Justices, such a day, to testify of their view, and what day they put to him. Witness, &c.”
CHAP. III.
After the three reasonable Essoins which accompany the view of the Land,[85] both parties being again present in Court, the Demandant should set forth his demand[86] and claim in this manner: “I demand against this H. half a Knight’s Fee or two ploughlands, in such a Vill, as my Right and Inheritance, of which my Father, or my Grand Father, was seised in his Demesne as of Fee in the time of King Henry the First, or after the first Coronation of our Lord the King, and from whence he took the profits to the Value of five shillings at least, as in Corn,[87] Hay, and other produce; and this I am ready to prove by my Freeman I. and, if any accident happen to him, by such a one, or by a third” (and the Demandant may thus name, as many as he chuses, but one of them only shall wage the Duel,[88]) “who saw this or heard it:”[89] or the Demandant may use other words thus—“and this I am ready to prove by my Freeman I. to whom his Father, when on his death-bed, injoined by the Faith which a Son owes to his Father, that if he ever heard a claim concerning that Land, he should prove this as that which his Father saw and heard.”[90]
The demand and claim of the Demandant being thus made, it shall be at the election of the Tenant, either to defend himself against the Demandant by the Duel,[91] or to put himself upon the King’s Grand Assise, and require a Recognition to ascertain, which of the two have the greater Right to the Land in dispute.