FERM or FEARM. By this ancient word is meant land, fundus; (q. v.) and, it is said, houses and tenements1 may pass by it. Co. Litt. 5 a.
FERRY. A place where persons and things are taken across a river or other stream in boats or other vessels2, for hire. 4 N. S. 426; S. C. 3 Harr. Lo. R. 341.
2. In England a ferry is considered a franchise3 which cannot be set up without the king's license4. In most, perhaps all of the United States, ferries are regulated by statute5.
3. The termini of a ferry are at the water's edge. 15 Pick. R. 254 and see 8 Greenl. R. 367; 4 John. Ch. R., 161; 2 Porter, R. 296; 7 Pick. R. 448; 2 Car. Law Repos. 69; 2 Dev. R. 403; 1 Murph. 279 1 Hayw. R. 457; Vin. Ab. h. t.; Com. Dig. Piscary B: 6 B. & Cr. 703; 12 East, R. 333; 1 Bail6. R. 469; 3 Watts7, R. 219 1 Yeates, R. 167; 9 S. & R. 26.
FERRYMAN. One employed in taking persons across a river or other stream, in boats or other contrivances at a ferry. The owner of a ferry is not considered a ferryman, when it is rented and in the possession of a tenant8. Minor9, R. 366.
2. Ferrymen are considered as common carriers, and are therefore the legal judges to decide when it is proper to pass over or not. 1 M'Cord, R. 444 Id. 157 1 N. & M. 19; 2 N. & M. 17. They are to regulate how the property to be taken across shall be put in their boats or flats; 1 M'Cord 157; and as soon as the carriage is fairly on the drop or slip of a fat, although driven by the owner's servant, it is in possession of the ferryman, and he is answerable. 1 M'Cord's R. 439.
FESTINUM REMEDIUM. A speedy remedy.
2. This is said of those cases where the remedy for the redress10 of an injury is given without any unnecessary delay. Bac. Ab. Assise, A. The action of Dower is festinum remedium, and so is Assise.
FETTERS11. A sort of iron put on the legs of malefactors, or persons accused of crimes.
2. When a prisoner is brought into court to plead he shall not be put in fetters. 2 Inst. 315; 3 Inst. 34; 2 Hale, 119; Hawk12. b. 21 c. 28, s. 1 Kel. 10; 1 Chitty's Cr. Law, 417. An officer having arrested a defendant13 on a civil suit, or a person accused of a crime, has no right to handcuff him unless it is necessary, or he has attempted to make his escape. 4 B. & C. 596; 10 Engl. C. L. Rep. 412, S. C.
FEUD14. This word, in Scotland, signifies a combination of kindred to revenge injuries or affronts15 done to any of their blood. Vide Fief.
FEUDA. In the early feudal16 times grants were made, in the first place, only during the pleasure of the grantor, and called muncra; (q. v.) afterwards for life, called beneficia; (q. v.) and, finally, they were extended to the vassal17 and his sons, and then they acquired the name offeudal. Dalr. Feud. Pr. 199.
FEUDAL. A term applied18 to whatever concerned a feud; as feudal law: feudal rights.
FEUDAL LAW. By this phrase is understood a political system which placed men and estates under hierarchical and multiplied distinctions of lords and vassals19. The principal features of this system were the following.
2. The right to all lands was vested in the sovereign. These were, parcelled out among the great men of the nation by its chief, to be held of him, so that the king had the Dominum directum, and the grantee or vassal, had what was called Dominum utile. It was a maxim20 nulle terre sans seigneur. These tenants21 were bound to perform services to the king, generally of a military character. These great lords again granted parts of the lands. they thus acquired, to other inferior vassals, who held under them, and were bound to perform services to the lord.
3. The principles of the feudal law will be found in Littleton's Tenures Wright's Tenures; 2 Blackstone's Com. c. 5 Dalrymple's History of Feudal Property; Sullivan's Lectures; Book of Fiefs; Spellman, Treatise22 of Feuds23 and Tenures; Le Grand Coutumier; the Salic Laws; The Capitularies; Les Establissements de St. touis; Assizes de Jerusalem; Poth. Des Fiefs. Merl. Rep. Feodalite; Dalloz, Dict. Feodalit 6; Guizot, Essais sur I'Histoire de France, Essai 5eme.
4. In the United States the feudal law never was in its full vigor24, though some of its principles are still retained. "Those principles are so interwoven with every part of our jurisprudence," says Ch. J. Tilghman, 3 S. & R. 447, " that to attempt to eradicate25 them would be to destroy the whole. They are massy stones worked into the foundation of our legal edifice26. Most of the inconveniences attending them, have been removed, and the few that remain can be easily removed, by acts of the legislature." See 3 Kent, Com. 509, 4th ed.
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