then offered, but not received. Since it appeared that the writ had never been legally served on Winthrop, the court adjudged that the action should not proceed and awarded appellant costs. 80 In the suit on the Massachusetts bond the plea in bar was likewise overruled, a general demurrer was joined in, and judgment was given for respondents Lechmere and Walley for Wltn costs. A review to the next Superior Court was prayed and granted on giving the usual security. 81 In the four appeals in the partition suits pleas to the jurisdiction were also overruled, general demurrers were joined in, and the Superior Court gave judgment for respondents in the several actions that partition be made of the lands in question. From these judgments reviews were also taken to the next Superior Court. 82 Later arguments of the colony were foreshadowed when distribution under the statute was justified as according to the custom of gavelkind. 83 One of these four reviews was argued at the Superior Court of March 23, 1724/5, when the court on demurrer was of the opinion that a declaration of the seisin of the ancestor and of the number of his children, or those who by law were to inherit, together with the proportions mentioned in the law, was insufficient to support the demand, the regulation whereof by the colony law was lodged with the Court of Probates. Judgment was thereupon given for appellant Winthrop with costs; the other three actions were continued to the 80 MS Conn. Superior Ct. Rec, 172.4-27, sub Sept. 22, 1724; 6 Winthrop Papers, 453. On November 6, Winthrop submitted to Christopher another inventory of personalty, but it was not accepted (Diary of Joshua Hempstead, 1 New London County Hist. Soc. Coll., 149). 81 MS Conn. Superior Court Rec, 1724-27, sub Sept. 22, 1724; 6 Winthrop Papers, 453. 82 MS Conn. Superior Ct. Rec., 1724-27, sub Sept. 22, 1724; 6 Winthrop Papers, 453-54. 83 Winthrop related that "at this Court I was insulted by an adverse attorney, who trumpt up gavelkind uppon me, (which has so long been out of date by Act of Parleament and which the Charter knew nothing of,) and made a long flourish of words how I was but a coe-heir, etc." (ibid., 428). To this contention that lands in the colony descended according to the custom of gavelkind reply had long before been made by Gershom Bulkeley, circa 1691—92. This legalistic divine argued that: (1) no place could commence any custom within time of memory; (2) no chartered corporation such as Connecticut could commence a custom contrary to the common law; (3) such corporation could make no law binding inheritances; (4) estates of inheritance granted under the Great Seal of England descended according to the course of the common law, citing the Case of the Earl of Derby, 2 Anderson 115; (5) gavelkind was a constant custom, whereas in the colony distribution was varied at the court's pleasure (this objection was obviated by the 1699 act); (6) under gavelkind sons divided to the exclusion of daughters and brothers to the exclusion of sisters, but in the colony females were frequently included in distributions; (7) under gavelkind sons inherited equally, in the colony the eldest son had a double share, at the court's pleasure; (8) the rights of the widow under the colony practice varied from gavelkind. Therefore Bulkeley concluded that "this practice thus is not according to the nature of gavelkind, but is a mixture of the judiciall law of Moses, and of the common law of England, with a smacke of the custome of gavelkind; something of each of them, and really none of them, and all without good warrant; and so is neither flesh nor good fish" (Wyllys Papers, 345~47)-