Bracton: Thorne Edition: English. Volume 3, Page 23

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Volume 3, Page 23

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[001] of forty days plus two flows and one ebb, because of ‘beyond the sea,’ and similarly
[002] the space of fifteen days after he enters the realm and also the four days as aforesaid,
[003] to gather his strength, etc. If he is out of the realm on simple pilgrimage to the Holy
[004] Land, he will then be allowed a delay of one year outside the realm and the fifteen
[005] days and the four within it, as was said above. If he is on a general passage to the
[006] Holy Land, a delay of three years will be allowed him, plus the fifteen days and the
[007] four as above. If within that time someone has been enfeoffed by the disseisor and
[008] the true lord on his return immediately ejects him, he will not recover by the assise,
[009] because such time, though long, is not to be counted against the absent. Thus one so
[010] enfeoffed can only blame himself, if he has not in the meantime protected himself by
[011] a writ de warrantia cartae.¹ All who delay for a longer time with respect to immediate
[012] restitution are assumed to have consigned their seisin to oblivion. Let them see to it,
[013] therefore, those who wish to eject at once, while the disseisin is fresh, that the injuria²
[014] of disseisin does not grow cool by acquiescence, dissimulation, negligence,
[015] weakness, despair, or negligent impetration, by which one loses possession, both
[016] natural and civil, and the disseisor begins to have both, so that he cannot be ejected
[017] without judgment. How one ought to be ejected immediately, or quasi-immediately,³
[018] and for whom the assise lies and for whom it does not, because [he was ejected] at
[019] once, will be shown by an example. I expel you from your free tenement by force and
[020] without judgment; the remedy by assise lies for you, as below. I eject you and you
[021] immediately eject me, while the disseisin is still fresh, I will not recover by the assise
[022] since I have suffered nothing more than what I inflicted upon you. I eject you, you
[023] immediately eject me and I then at once re-eject you [and you me]; the assise for
[024] recovering seisin still does [not] lie for me against you⁴ and this will be true ad infinitum,
[025] that the true possessor may eject immediately and the assise does not lie
[026] against him, and if he is again immediately re-ejected by the spoliator he may again
[027] eject him and the assise does not lie for the spoliator, since nothing other than what he
[028] himself did has been done to him. But if the true possessor is negligent after the disseisin,
[029] a negligent impetrator, acquiescing in and ignoring the injuria, completely
[030] helpless or despairing of his strength, as was said above, so that he loses both possessions,
[031] natural and civil, his only remedy is by the assise. If he disdains the assise
[032] and presumes to usurp his possession by force rather than judgment, the assise lies
[033] for the spoliator because of the usurpation, not because he is wrongfully disseised,
[034] but because he is disseised without judgment, and because, by the negligence of the
[035] true lord, he began to have possession, natural, that is, and civil. If the true lord
[036] wishes to have his re-entry, he will seldom or ever be heard except on the property.
[037] If he wishes to return to the assise, which at first was available to him, he may not,
[038] because he does not merit the assise and the favour of the law, for he vainly

Notes

1. Infra 41, 48, 58

2. ‘iniuria’

3. ‘[vel] quasi incontinenti,’ from line 19

4. ‘contra te’