"nieces. And, if that decifion go farther, and de"termine that fuch a document is not admiffible in " evidence unless inftances in fact be previously proved 66 to warrant the production of it, I must beg leave "to diffent from it. In this cafe, fuppofing the "defendant had demurred to this evidence, I think "the court must have drawn the fame conclufion "from it, which the jury have drawn ; and therefore "on the law of the cafe, I think that the rule for a new trial fhould be discharged." OF F the two modes of acquiring a title to real pro- Of Title by perty, the first, namely, Defcent, has been treated of in the preceding title. We now, therefore, come to the fecond, that is, Purchase, which is thus defined by Littleton, f. 12. "Purchase is called the poffeffion "of lands or tenements, that a man hath by his deed 66 or agreement; unto which poffeffion he cometh not 66 by title or defcent from any of his ancestors or "coufins, but by his own deed." Purchase. I § 2. Lord Coke, in his comment on this fection, 1 Inft. 18 b. obferves, that a purchase is always intended by title, and, most properly, by fome kind of conveyance, either for money, or for fome other confideration, or freely of gift; for that is, in law, also a purchase. But Plowd. 47. But a descent, because it comes merely by act of law, is not faid to be a purchase: and, accordingly, the makers of the ftatute 1 Hen. 5. c. 3. fpeak of those, who have lands or tenements by purchase, or descent of inheritance. § 3. The feudal writers called purchase conqueftus or conquifitio, both denoting any means of acquiring an eftate, out of the common courfe of inheritance; and Grand Couft. the Norman jurists ftiled the first purchaser, or perfon who first acquired the eftate, the conquereur: and Glanville uses the word queftus, to denote the property which a perfon has acquired by his own act, and not by defcent, c. 25. Lib. 7. c. I. 2 Com. 243. § 4. The difference between the acquifition of an estate by descent, and by purchase, confifts principally in two points: 1ft, That, by purchase, the estate acTit. 29. c. 3. quires a new inheritable quality, and is defcendible to the owner's blood in general, as a feud of indefinite antiquity. 2dly, An eftate, taken by purchase, will not make the perfon who acquires it anfwerable for the acts of his ancestors, as an estate by defcent will. 1. 39. § 5. The first mode of acquiring an estate by purchafe is, where the lord becomes entitled to the lands of his tenant, in confequence of the death of fuch tenant without heirs, which is called an Efcheat. § 6. Lord Coke fays, that efcheat, efchaeta, is a word of art, and derived from the French word efcheat, id eft, cadere, excidere, or accidere; and fignifies properly, when |