thereof among co-parceners, joint tenants, or tenants in common, heirs, portioners, conjux fiars, or joint proprietors of any sort; If no sum of money, or only a sum under 3001. shall be paid, or agreed to be paid, for equality of partition or division, the ordinary duty of, And if any sum or sums of money, amounting to 3007. or upwards, shall be paid, or agreed to be paid, for equality, 1 15 0 The same ud valorem duty as for conveyance on the sale of lands for a sum of money equal to the amount of the sum or sums so paid or agreed to be paid. And where any such deed of partition or division, together with any schedule, receipt, or other matter put or indorsed thereon or annexed thereto, shall contain 2,160 words or upwards, then for every entire quantity of 1,080 words contained therein, over and above the first 1,080 words, a further progressive duty of, If the deed is liable, in the first instance, to a duty of 17. 15s., 150 Or if liable to a higher duty in the first instance, . 1 0 0 And any duplicate of any such deed of partition or division shall be charged with the same duty or duties. And in case there shall be no more than one deed for completing the title to the estate or interest conveyed by either party, the principal deed only shall be charged under this head of partition; and any subordinate or collateral deed shall be charged with the duty to which it may be liable under any other description in this schedule." 3 GEO. IV. c. 117. "An act to reduce the stamp duties on reconveyances of mortgages, and in certain other cases; and to amend, &c." Sect. 2. "And be it further enacted, that from and after the expiration of ten days next after the passing of this act, in lieu and instead of the duties by this act repealed, there shall be granted, raised, levied, collected and paid unto his Majesty, his heirs and successors, the several sums of money and duties following, that is to say, upon any transfer, assignment, disposition, assignation or reconveyance of any mortgage, or of any other security in the said acts and the schedules thereto annexed, in that respect severally mentioned, or of the benefit thereof, or of the money or stock thereby secured, provided no further sum of money or stock be added to the principal money or stock already secured, there shall be paid in Great Britain a stamp duty of 17. 15s., and in Ireland a stamp duty of 17. British currency, for the first skin or piece of vellum or parchment, or sheet or piece of paper, upon which such transfer, assignment, disposition, assignation or reconveyance shall be engrossed, written or printed; and where any such transfer or assignment, disposition or assignation, in Great Britain, hereby charged with the duty of 17. 15s., together with any schedule, receipt or other matter put or indorsed thereon or annexed thereto, shall contain 2,160 words or upwards, then for every entire quantity of 1,080 words contained therein, over and above the first 1,080 words, there shall be paid a further progressive duty of 11. 5s.; and for every skin or piece of vellum or parchment, or sheet or piece of paper beyond the first, upon which any such transfer, assignment or reconveyance shall be engrossed, written or printed in Ireland, there shall be paid the sum of 10s. British currency; and if any further sum of money or stock shall be added to the principal money or stock already secured, the ad valorem duty on mortgages, payable under the said recited acts respectively, shall be charged only in respect of such further money or stock.” Sect. 3. "And be it further enacted, that where any deed or other instrument already made or hereafter to be made as an additional or further security for any sum or sums of money, or any share or shares in any of the government or parliamentary stocks or funds, or in the stock and funds of the Governor and Company of the Bank of England or of the Bank of Ireland, already or previously secured by any bond on which the ad valorem duty on bonds, charged by the said recited acts of the fifty-fifth and fifty-sixth years of the reign of his said late Majesty, and the schedules thereto respectively annexed, shall have been paid, such deed or other instrument shall be and be deemed to be and to have been exempt from the several ad valorem duties charged by the said acts, and the said schedules respectively on mortgages, and shall be charged and chargeable only with the ordinary duty payable on deeds in general in Great Britain and Ireland respectively; but if any further sum of money or stock shall be added to the principal money or stock already secured, the said ad valorem duties respectively shall be charged in respect of such further sum of money or stock; and if necessary for the sake of evidence, the deeds and instruments hereby exempted from the said ad valorem duties shall be stamped with a particular stamp for denoting or testifying the payment of the ad valorem duty upon all the deeds and instruments relating to the particular transaction, provided such deeds and instruments shall be produced at the stamp-office in London or Dublin (as the case may require), and shall appear to be duly stamped with the duties to which they are liable." 53 GEO. III. c. 141. "An act to repeal an act of the 17th year of the reign of his present Majesty, intituled 'An act for registering the grants of life annuities, and for the better protection of infants against such grants;' and to substitute other provisions in lieu thereof." 'Whereas it is expedient that an act passed in the seventeenth year of his present Majesty, intituled an act,' &c. 'should be repealed, and other provisions substituted in lieu thereof;' May it therefore please, &c., and be it enacted by, &c., "That the said recited act shall be and the same is hereby repealed, save and except so far as regards any annuities or rent-charges, which have been granted before the passing of this act." Sect. 2. "And be it further enacted, that within thirty days after the execution of every deed, bond, instrument or other assurance, whereby any annuity or rent-charge shall, from and after the passing of this act, be granted for one or more life or lives, or for any term of years or greater estate determinable on one or more life or lives, a memorial of the date of every such deed, bond, instrument or other assurance, of the names of all parties and of all the witnesses thereto, and of the person or persons for whose life or lives such annuity or rent-charge shall be granted, and of the person or persons by whom the same is to be beneficially received, the pecuniary consideration or considerations for granting the same, and the annual sum or sums to be paid, shall be inrolled in the High Court of Chancery, in the form or to the effect following, with such alterations therein as the nature and circumstance of any particular case may reasonably require : otherwise every such deed, bond, instrument or other assurance shall be null and void to all intents and purposes." Sect. 3. "Provided always and be it further enacted, that if any such annuity shall be granted by, or to or for the benefit of any company exceeding in number ten persons, which company shall be formed for the purpose of granting or purchasing annuities, it shall be sufficient in any such memorial to describe such company by the usual firm or name of trade." Sect. 4. "And be it further enacted, that in every deed, bond, instru VOL. II. Ꭰ Ꭰ ment or other assurance, whereby any annuity or rent-charge shall from and after the passing of this act be granted, or attempted to be granted, for one or more life or lives, or for any term of years or greater estate determinable on one or more life or lives, where the person or persons to whom such annuity shall be granted or secured to be paid shall not be intitled thereto beneficially, the name or names of the person or persons who is or are intended to take the annuity beneficially shall be described in such or the like manner as is hereinbefore required in the inrolment, otherwise every such deed, instrument or other assurance shall be null and void." Sect. 6. "And be it further enacted, that if any part of the consideration for the purchase of any such annuity or rent-charge shall be returned to the person advancing the same, or in case such consideration or any part of it shall be paid in notes, if any of the notes, with the privity and consent of the person advancing the same, shall not be paid when due, or shall be cancelled or destroyed without being first paid; or if such consideration is expressed to be paid in money, but the same or any part of it shall be paid in goods; or if the consideration or any part of it shall be retained on pretence of answering the future payments of the annuity or rent-charge, or any other pretence; in all and every the aforesaid cases it shall be lawful for the person by whom the annuity or rent-charge is made payable, or whose property is liable to be charged or affected thereby, to apply to the court in which any action shall be brought for payment of the annuity or rent-charge, or judgment entered, by motion to stay proceedings on the action or judgment, and if it shall appear to the court that such practices as aforesaid, or any of them, have been used, it shall and may be lawful for the court to order every deed, bond, instrument or other assurance, whereby the annuity or rent-charge is secured, to be cancelled, and the judgment, if any has been entered, to be vacated." [Sect. 8 declares all contracts for the purchase of any annuity or rentcharge with any person under the age of twenty-one years, to be utterly void, notwithstanding any attempt to confirm the same after such person attains twenty-one; and makes it a misdemeanor to prevail on an infant to grant or bind himself, when of age, to grant an annuity or rent-charge, or to forego the plea of infancy, or to ratify the annuity when of age.] Sect. 10. "And be it further enacted, that this act shall not extend to Scotland or Ireland, nor to any annuity or rent-charge given by will or marriage settlement, or for the advancement of a child, nor to any annuity or rent-charge secured upon freehold or copyhold or customary lands in Great Britain or Ireland, or in any of his Majesty's possessions beyond the seas, of equal or greater annual value than the said annuity, over and above any other annuity, and the interest of any principal sum charged or secured thereon, of which the grantee had notice at the time of the grant, whereof the grantor is seized in fee simple or fee tail in possession, or the fee simple whereof in possession the grantor is enabled to charge at the time of the grant, or secured by the actual transfer of stock in any of the public funds, the dividends whereof are of equal or greater annual value than the said annuity; nor to any voluntary annuity or rent-charge granted without regard to pecuniary consideration or money's worth, nor to any annuity or rent-charge granted by any body corporate, or under any authority or trust created by act of parliament." 3 GEO. IV. c. 92. "An act to explain an act of the fifty-third year of the reign of his late Majesty, respecting the enrolment of memorials of grants of annuities." "And whereas the form or effect to which such enactment refers is expressed in several columns, at the head of one of which are the words names of witnesses,' and underneath, as applicable to indentures of lease and release, the letters and words 'E. F. of,' 'G. H. of'; and as applicable to a bond and warrant of attorney to confess judgment, the letters 'E. F.,' 'G. H.' without the word of,': And whereas the words of enactment referring to such form express only that a memorial of the names of all the witnesses to every such deed, bond, instrument or other assurance as therein mentioned should be enrolled as directed by the said act, without providing that any description of the witnesses should be given in such memorial, except as such form is thereby referred to, and such form does not provide that any description should be added to such names except by the addition of the word of' to the letters 'E. F' as aforesaid, as applicable to indentures of lease and release: And whereas in consequence of such indistinct enactment it may be doubtful whether it was the intention of the legislature to require any, or, if any, what description to be added to the names of witnesses in the memorial of any deed, instrument or assurance to be enrolled as aforesaid: And whereas a very great number of memorials of grants of annuities have since the passing of the said act been enrolled, in which the names of the witnesses to the deeds, instruments or assurances specified in such memorials have been inserted without the addition of the place of abode of such witnesses, and it has been inferred from the use of the word 'of' after such letters 'E. F. and after such letters 'G. H.' as aforesaid, that it was necessary to describe each of such witnesses in such memorial as of some place, and in consequence thereof some grants of annuities made since the passing of the said act have been, in proceedings in summary applications to courts of justice, which cannot be reviewed in any superior court, deemed null and void on the ground that no description of the place of abode of the witnesses to some or one of the deeds, instruments or assurances by which such grants of annuities have been made, had been inserted in the memorials or memorial thereof enrolled as directed by the said act; And whereas doubts have been entertained whether the construction so put on the said act is the true construction thereof, more especially as the same is so far penal as it renders deeds, instruments and assurances, of which memorials have not been enrolled in pursuance of the said act, null and void, and the provisions in the said act are not so clear and explicit as the same ought to have been under such circumstances, and the parties claiming under grants of annuities may have |