The Scotch Entails Amendment Bill, even as pruned down and
tempered by the vigilance of the lawyers and landowners in the Upper House, is a remarkable measure, though Mr. Disraeli forgot to mention it at the Mansion House. It gives the limited owner of entailed estates—the tenant for life, in most cases—a power of charging the value of certain improvements upon the land, and authorises the Court of Session to estimate the expectancy of "proximate heirs" so as to allow the owner in possession to buy them out and to free the estate. The first part of the Bill is by far the more important, and the precedent it creates must have a powerful influence on legislation in England affecting landed property. It will not be forgotten that the House of Commons has been willing to allow the tenant for life of an estate in Scot- land to charge the land in perpetuity with the entire cost of the "improvements" he may choose to make, including not only drainage, fencing, and road-making, but the building of cottages, shooting-boxes, and even public-houses. The Lords, it is true, have limited the period within which the improvements to be charged must be executed to twenty years, and the time for which they may be charged to twenty-five years, and have cut down the amount that may be charged to two-thirds of the total value. But they have left the principle untouched, and the prin- ciple will go far to free the land from its parchment fetters.
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