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The grantee en roture was governed by the same rules as the one en censive except with respect to the descent of lands in cases of intestacy. All land grants to the censitaires or as they preferred to call themselves in Canada, habitants were invariably shaped like a parallelogram, with a narrow frontage on the river varying from two to three arpents, and with a depth from four to eight arpents.
Hence it was that the British officials, although altogether well-intentioned, allowed grave wrongs to arise. The new English judges, not unnaturally, misunderstood the seigneurial system. They stumbled readily into the error that tenure en censive was simply the old English tenure in copyhold under another name.
So the Canadian peasant, a feudal tenant en censive or en roture, yet wished not to be called censitaire or roturier, names which he thought degrading; he preferred to be called a habitant, an inhabitant of the country, a free man, not a vassal.
He was expected to have his seigneury surveyed into farms, or en censive holdings, and to procure, as quickly as might be, settlers for these farms. It was highly desirable, of course, that the seigneurs should lend a hand in encouraging the immigration of people from their old homes in France. Some of them did this.
The whole success of the seigniorial system, as a means of settling the country, depended on the extent to which the seigniors were able to grant their lands en censive or en roture. The censitaire who held his lands in this way could not himself sub-infeudate.
The result was that all lands previously held en fief, en arrière fief, en censive, or en roture, under the old French system, were henceforth placed on the footing of lands in the other provinces, that is to say, free and common socage. The seigniors received liberal remuneration for the abolition of the lods et ventes, droit de banalité, and other rights declared legal by the court.
"Where are the fences?" quoth Andre-Louis, waving the hand that held the comb, as if to indicate the openness of the place. "Fences!" snorted the sergeant. "What have fences to do with the matter? This is terre censive. There is no grazing here save by payment of dues to the Marquis de La Tour d'Azyr." "But we are not grazing," quoth the innocent Andre-Louis. "To the devil with you, zany!
"There is," said a voice at Pantaloon's elbow, "no such thing as communal land in the proper sense in all M. de La Tour d'Azyr's vast domain. This is a terre censive, and his bailiffs collect his dues from all who send their beasts to graze here."
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