Blacks Law Dict. 1st ed

351

DEMANDANT

DEMISE

DEMANDANT. The plaintiff or party suing in a real action. Co. Litt. 127. DEMANDRESS. A female demandant. DEMEASE. In old English law. Death. DEMEMBBATION. In Scotch law. Maliciously cutting off or otherwise separat ing one limb from another. 1 Hume, 323; Bell. DEMENS. One whose mental faculties are enfeebled; one who has lost his mind; distinguishable from amens, one totally in sane. 4 Coke, 128. DEMENTED. Of unsound mind. DEMENTENANT EN AVANT. L. Fr. From this time forward. Kelham. DEMENTIA. In medical jurisprudence. That form of insanity where the mental de rangement is accompanied with a general derangement of the faculties. It is character ized by forgetfulness, inability to follow any train of thought, and indifference to passing events. 4 Sawy. 677, per Field, J. Senile dementia is that peculiar decay of the mental faculties which occurs in extreme old age, and in many cases much earlier, whereby the person is reduced to second childhood, and becomes sometimes wholly in competent to enter into any binding contract, or even to execute a will. It is the recur rence of second childhood by mere decay. 1 Redf. Wills, 63. Dementia denotes an impaired state of the men tal powers, a feebleness of mind caused by disease, and not accompanied by delusion or uncontrol lable impulse, without defining the degree of inca pacity. Dementia may exist without complete prostration of the mental powers. 44 N. H. 531. DEMESNE. Domain; dominical; held in one's own right, and not of a superior; not allotted to tenants. See DEMESNE LANDS. *In the language of pleading, own; prop er; original. Thus, son assault demesne, his own assault, his assault originally or in the first place. DEMESNE AS OF FEE. A man is said to be seised in his demesne as offee of a corporeal inheritance, because he has a prop erty, dominicum or demesne, in the thing it self. But when he has no dominion in the thing itself, as in the case of an incorporeal hereditament, he is said to be seised as of fee, and not in bis demesne as of fee. 2 Bl. Oomm. 106; Littleton, § 10; 17 Serg. & B. 196.

DEMESNE LANDS. In English law. Those lands of a manor not granted out in tenancy, but reserved by the lord for hia own use and occupation. Lands set apart and appropriated by the lord for his own private use, as for the supply of his table, and the maintenance of his family; the op posite of tenemental lands. Tenancy and demesne, however, were not in every sense the opposites of each other; lands held for years or at will being included among de mesne lands, as well as those in the lord's actual possession. Spelman; 2 Bl. Cotnm. 90. DEMESNE LANDS OF THE CROWN. That share of lands reserved to the crown at the original distribution of landed property, or which came to it after wards by forfeiture or otherwise. 1 Bl. Comm. 286; 2 Steph. Comm. 550. DEMESNIAL. Pertaining to & demesne. DEMI. French. Half; the half. Used chiefly in composition. DEMI-MARK. Half a mark; a sum of money which was anciently required to be tendered in a writ of right, the effect of such tender being to put the demandant, in the first instance, upon proof of the seisin as stated in his count; that is, to prove that the seisin was in the king's reign there stated. Rose. Real Act. 216. DEMI-OFFICIAL. Partly official or au thorized. Having color of official right. DEMI-SANGUE, or DEMY-SANGUB. Half-blood. DEMI-VILL. A town consisting of five freemen, or frank-pledges. Spelman. DEMIDIETAS. In old records. A half or moiety. DEMIES. In some universities and col leges this term is synonymous with "schol ars. " DEMINUTIO. In the civil law. A tak ing away; loss or deprivation. See CAPITIS DJEMINUTIO. DEMISE,©. In conveyancing. To convey or create an estate for years or life; to lease. The usual and operative word in leases: "Have granted, demised, and to farm let, and by these presents do grant, demise, and to farm let." 2 Bl. Comm. 317; 1 Steph. Comm. 476; Co. Litt. 45a. DEMISE, n. In conveyancing. A convey ance of an estate to another for life, for years*

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