a word akin to the verb to let (French, laisser; German, lassen), may be defined as a conveyance by contract, from the lessor of lands, tenements, &c., for a given term of years or at will, in consideration of rent paid, or other service rendered by the lessee. As distinct from an assignment, the lessor, in granting a lease, does not part with his interest in the subjects leased, and hence there is no valid lease where there is no reversion; and by virtue of this reversion the lessor is invested with power to distrain in failure of payment or in case of any other breach of fealty. Whatever words be used in granting a contract of lease (the usual form being "demise, grant, and to farm let"), the duties and rights of both parties are secured when there is sufficient evidence of an intent on the part of a proprietor of yielding, and on the part of the lessee of holding, possession for a determinate time. Originally, when no writing was necessary, a valid lease was not completed without actual entry; but now, although a deed is necessary only in a few exceptional cases, arising from some peculiarity in the nature of the property to be leased, leases, like other covenants, are generally made by deeds. The conditions on which a lease is granted may embrace anything that is lawful; and there is no authority which can interfere with the granting of leases on any term by parties who have the complete ownership of the property. In cases where ownership only amounts to a divided interest in the subjects, leases are granted under particular powers according to certain statutes; but certain classes who have only a temporary interest in the property, and hold it, for example, only during a precarious tenure of office, are (as the holders of benefices by 13th Elizabeth, chap. 20) restrained from executing deeds of this nature, intended to be valid beyond the period of their proprietary. An act passed in 1845 (8th and 9th Vict., c. 124) has for its object the simplification of the terms used in granting leases. Without rendering invalid the forms previously in use, it gives schedules of abbreviated expressions which are considered to be equally legal with the older and more cumbersome forms, and when taxed are, ceteris paribus, to be regarded as involving equal merit by the taxing officer. This act, however, does not extend beyond England.

In Scotland the first statute in favour of tenants was that of 1449, c. 17, which secured them against purchasers of the lands, until the expiry of their leases, provided they paid their rent to the new proprietors. Before that date a lease was disregarded in a competition with a subsequent proprietor, whose titles were completed by charter and saisine. To bring the lease under the protection of the statute, it must be granted by a legally qualified party,—it must be in writing, and definite as to rent, and term of endurance. The tenant must also be in actual occupancy under it. Though these conditions are required to render the lease available against third parties, who subsequently become proprietors, they are not required for the purpose of protecting the tenant against the granter of the lease and his heirs. A perpetual lease, or one with a nominal rent, or which directs the rent to be disposed of otherwise than in payment to the landlord, or entitles the tenant to demand a renewal for ever, is good, not only against the landlord by whom it was granted, but against his heirs, seeing that his heirs cannot be in a better position than the party whom they claim to represent. To protect the tenant against strangers coming by purchase, or by the act of the law as creditors, into what is called the feudal right to the lands, it is necessary that the granter of the lease have his own title, as proprietor, made up by charter and saisine, or at least that that he done before the ownership of the lands passes out of his hands. If the granter be a pupil, a lease cannot last longer than the office of his tutor; but minors, that is boys above fourteen, and girls above twelve years of age, may, with consent of their curators, grant leases to endure after their majority, provided the terms be just and equitable. If the terms be injurious to the minor, the lease may be set aside on that ground, if challenged by an action at law raised within four years after the minor attains majority. A lease granted by an heir, who, in virtue of his appurtenance, has been three years in possession, though he may not have made up his title, will be good against a subsequent heir, but not against either an adjudging creditor, or a subsequent proprietor. The owner of an estate who has granted an heritable bond over it, may afterwards grant a valid lease, but not after certain steps have been adopted to recover the debt, commencing by what is called adjudication; nor after the use of inhibition, which is a preventive measure, unless the lease be according to the course of ordinary administration. If the estate of a proprietor be sequestrated for debt, he can no longer grant a lease; neither is one granted on deathbed available to the prejudice of the heir-at-law. A different proprietor may grant a lease to terminate at his death. Heirs of entail in possession can only grant such leases as the deeds of entail permit.

As it is presumed, unless otherwise specially provided by the lease, that the tenant is merely entitled to the annual produce of the lands, or occupancy of the houses and the like, it follows, that unless otherwise provided, mines and minerals, trees, the right of hunting, and the landlord's right over the crop of each year in security of the rent of the year of which it is the crop, are reserved to the landlord. The security over household furniture, cattle, or stocking, lasts for three months after the last term of payment of the year's rent. In the use of reserved rights, the landlord must compensate the tenant for any damage which, in the exercise of these rights, he may occasion.

The destination of a lease is matter of arrangement, otherwise it goes to the heir-at-law of the tenant on his death. A tenant's creditors, and even his assignees, as well as his right of subsetting, may be excluded. All questions of this kind should be well considered and provided for when the lease is being entered into.

The tenant is bound to stock, manure, and labour the farm according to the rules of good husbandry; and he has right to the annual fruits, and to the occupation of the subject. If the subject be destroyed, as, for example, if a house or mill be burnt down or become ruinous, or a mine becomes unexpectedly exhausted, no rent is exigible. Even where, from some extraordinary calamity, land has become sterile, or, from remarkable inclemency of the weather, the crop is lost, so that the tenant cannot recover the value of the seed, rent cannot be exacted. Where such occurrences as these do not happen, the conditions of the lease must be strictly observed on both sides. The landlord and his heirs must protect the tenant in his possession during the currency of the lease; and the tenant must pay his rent and perform all the other obligations which he has undertaken. It is the duty of the landlord to uphold the subject leased, unless otherwise provided, and the tenant is responsible for such damage as he may occasion, ordinary tear and wear excepted.

We have said that a Scotch lease must be in writing. A verbal lease is in no case binding against any party for more than one year, and a written lease, silent as to the period of its duration, is regarded as being for one year only, or for the shortest period beyond a year that can be construed from its terms. In some cases where money has been expended to a large amount on the faith of a verbal lease, damages may be given; and where it appears that the party challenging a verbal lease, has done some act, plainly in recognition of a succeeding year, the lease will be sustained till the expiry of such succeeding year; but that only in questions with the grantor and his heirs, and not in questions with succeeding proprietors. As a verbal lease may be resiled from after a year, it is not competent to establish a longer duration by a reference to oath. On the other hand, though writing is required, it is not necessary that it should be a formal, or, as the law of Scotland calls it, a prohative writing, provided it have been followed by possession of the subject on the part of the tenant. Accordingly, a written obligation to grant a formal lease, followed by possession, will save the rights of the tenant, not only against the grantor and his heirs, but even against third parties who have subsequently become proprietors, provided it expresses the requisites of the Act 1449—namely, a fixed rent, and a definite period of endurance. It is not necessary that the fixed rent be in money; a grain rent, or even service is sufficient; but if the rent be nominal (although no criterion for determining what is clausory, has yet been authoritatively settled), or if the rent is to be retained till a debt due by the landlord is extinguished, the lease will be voidable at the instance of a subsequent proprietor. In the same way, if the term of endurance, though determinate, be unusually long,—such as, while water runs down, or grass grows up,—or if it be renewable for ever, or even for a period unknown in ordinary practice, the lease will be voidable at the instance of a subsequent proprietor, as being substantially destructive of the right of property, though it may be available against the grantor and his heirs. Of course it is otherwise if the purchaser, at acquiring the property, was taken bound to recognise the lease, or, if he afterwards voluntarily homologated it. It is to be regretted that no judgment has yet been given in Scotland fixing the utmost length of lease that shall be available against subsequent purchasers. All, we believe, that can be safely said on this subject at present is, that a lease for twice nineteen years, is usually regarded as suitable where improvements are contemplated; and that in coal or mineral, and building leases, owing to the great expenses involved, an enlarged period, in order that the tenant may be indemnified, is usual. Different leases seem to be unobjectionable. Sometimes a lease declares that part of the rent shall be expended in necessary improvements on the subject leased, and such a lease will be binding against a purchaser, provided the improvements be executed subsequent to the date of his purchase, as they enhance the value of the subject; but if they were executed prior to the date of his purchase, they will not form a claim of abatement from the rent, because it is to be presumed that the purchaser paid an increased price for the improved subject. In this last case the tenant's claim for indemnity will lie only against the seller or his heirs. If improvements to be executed after the date of the purchase, are of an extraordinary character, such as the building of a new house, the purchaser may prevent their being executed, leaving to the tenant his claim of damages against the seller.

A power of assigning a lease, or sub-letting the subject, is not implied, unless the lease be for more than nineteen years, or is given to the tenant in different, or unless the subject leased be an urban tenement. An assignation and a sub-lease require for their completion to be followed by possession. The shortest lease, however, may be attached by the tenant's creditors, by what is called adjudication, unless it contain a clause expressly excluding assignees and sub-tenants; and then neither voluntary nor judicial assignees can be received.

When a lease has reached its natural termination, unless it be a different lease, it is still held to exist from year to year on its original terms, by what, in Scotland, is called tacit relocation, until either the landlord shall intimate to the tenant, or the tenant shall intimate to the landlord, his intention to have it terminated; and such intimation must be made forty days before the term of Whitsunday of the year in which it is meant to bring the lease to a close. This intimation is called a warning. It may be given many ways. One mode, proceeding on a precept from the landlord, is regulated by the Scotch statute 1555, c. 39. Another mode is regulated by an Act of Sederunt of the Court of Session, dated 14th December 1756. By a recent statute regulating sheriff-court procedure, the length of the warning required by the Act of Sederunt has got six days added to it. Even where there is a regular lease, in which there is generally a clause binding the tenant to remove at its expiry without warning, he is entitled to rely on the lease being continued by tacit relocation, till he receive a regular warning. On such a lease it is competent, prior to the forty days, to give a charge in virtue of letters of horning to remove. A lease may be brought to a close before its natural term, by the tenant's desertion, or failure to pay his rent. In such a case the landlord should apply for judicial authority to let the lands for the unexpired portion of the lease. It is also competent to proceed by a summons before the sheriff, concluding to have the tenant ordained, within a certain time, to stock and plough the farm, and labour and manure it in terms of his lease; or if the lease be silent as to the mode, according to the rule of good husbandry; and failing his doing so, that he should be removed, and the landlord found entitled to resume possession. The tenant may be removed by a like form of process, if he have subset the farm contrary to the provisions of the lease, or if he have suffered two years' rent to remain unpaid. This last ground of irritancy is provided for by the Act of Sederunt 1756; and unless the arrears be paid before judgment is pronounced, the lease is at an end. Even where a tenant falls into one year's arrear of rent, or deserts his farm at the usual time of labouring it, the landlord may, by the same Act of Sederunt, sue the tenant to find security for the arrears, and the rent of the five following years, within a certain time, to be limited by the sheriff, under pain of compulsory removal. Of course a written lease may be terminated at any time by a written renunciation executed by either party, and accepted in writing by the other. In urban tenements a warning to remove is sufficient if it be proved to have been given verbally, or by a peculiar form called chalking the door by a burgh officer.

The rights of the feudal superior of the subjects remain always unaffected by any transaction between landlord and tenant.

Leases in general require an ad valorem stamp. Leases in consideration of a premium, without any yearly rent, or with a yearly rent under £20, are charged the same amount, with the exception of leases and tacks for lives, not exceeding three; and leases for a term absolute, not exceeding 21 years, granted by ecclesiastical corporations, aggregate or sole, when the duties on such leases would, under 13th and 14th Vict., c. 97, amount to 35s. or upwards.

| Stamp Duty | Terms not exceeding 30 years | Above 30 and not above 100 | Exceeding 100 years | |------------|-----------------------------|---------------------------|--------------------| | Rent not exceeding £5 | L. s. d. 0 0 6 | L. s. d. 0 3 0 | L. s. d. 0 6 0 | | Above £5, and not above 10 | L. s. d. 0 1 0 | L. s. d. 0 6 0 | L. s. d. 0 12 0 | | ... 15 | L. s. d. 0 1 5 | L. s. d. 0 9 0 | L. s. d. 0 18 0 | | ... 20 | L. s. d. 0 2 0 | L. s. d. 0 12 0 | L. s. d. 0 14 0 | | ... 25 | L. s. d. 0 2 5 | L. s. d. 0 15 0 | L. s. d. 0 11 0 | | ... 30 | L. s. d. 0 3 0 | L. s. d. 0 18 0 | L. s. d. 0 16 0 | | ... 35 | L. s. d. 0 3 5 | L. s. d. 0 21 0 | L. s. d. 0 21 0 | | ... 40 | L. s. d. 0 4 0 | L. s. d. 0 24 0 | L. s. d. 0 26 0 | | ... 45 | L. s. d. 0 4 5 | L. s. d. 0 27 0 | L. s. d. 0 31 0 | | ... 50 | L. s. d. 0 5 0 | L. s. d. 0 30 0 | L. s. d. 0 36 0 | | ... 55 | L. s. d. 0 5 5 | L. s. d. 0 33 0 | L. s. d. 0 41 0 | | ... 60 | L. s. d. 0 6 0 | L. s. d. 0 36 0 | L. s. d. 0 46 0 | | ... 65 | L. s. d. 0 6 5 | L. s. d. 0 39 0 | L. s. d. 0 51 0 | | ... 70 | L. s. d. 0 7 0 | L. s. d. 0 42 0 | L. s. d. 0 56 0 | | ... 75 | L. s. d. 0 7 5 | L. s. d. 0 45 0 | L. s. d. 0 61 0 | | ... 80 | L. s. d. 0 8 0 | L. s. d. 0 48 0 | L. s. d. 0 66 0 | | ... 85 | L. s. d. 0 8 5 | L. s. d. 0 51 0 | L. s. d. 0 71 0 | | ... 90 | L. s. d. 0 9 0 | L. s. d. 0 54 0 | L. s. d. 0 76 0 | | ... 95 | L. s. d. 0 9 5 | L. s. d. 0 57 0 | L. s. d. 0 81 0 | | ... 100 | L. s. d. 1 0 0 | L. s. d. 0 60 0 | L. s. d. 0 86 0 |

In the case of a lease under thirty years, if the rent be under £20, and a fine, premium, or grassum be paid, then the duty is to be the same as on a sale; and if the rent be above £20, both the lease-duty and sale-duty are exigible.

In the case of a lease, to which the second and third columns apply, where there is a fine, premium, or grassum, and whatever the amount of rent, both the lease and sale-duty are exigible. See 13th and 14th Vict., c. 97, and 17th and 18th Vict., c. 83.