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Thus re-granted, the seigneur could not eject the habitant, but was allowed to receive a nominal or feudal rent from the vassal, and the usual droits. These droits are, first, the barbarous "lods et ventes," or one thirteenth of the money upon every transfer which the habitant makes by sale only; but the original rent can never be raised, whatever value the land may have attained.
The lady accepted the homage of Sieur Tranchelot, graciously remitted the lods et ventes, the fines payable to the seigneur, gave him the cup of wine to drink when he rose to his feet, and ordered him to be generously entertained by her majordomo, and sent back to the Bocage rejoicing.
In case the censitaire wished to dispose of his holding during his lifetime, it was subject to the lods et ventes, or to a tax of one-twelfth of the purchase money, which had to be paid to the seignior, who usually as a favour remitted one-fourth on punctual payment.
So these charges were often increased; in time instead of a penny the habitant had to pay three-pence, six-pence, and even eight-pence, an acre; the seigneurs, as a judge put it, showed an excellent knowledge of arithmetical progression. Thus the cens et rentes began to bring in a real income. So did the lods et ventes, the tax of one-twelfth of the price of whatever land the habitant sold.
Among his works may be named Hasselnödder, Jöden, "The Jew," Jodinden, "The Jewess," Jan van Huysum's Blomsterstykke, "Jan van Huysum's Flowerpiece," Den Engleske Lods, "The English Pilot," and a great number of lyric poems. The poems of his last five years are as popular to-day as ever. Wergeland died in 1845.
We are now on the high road from Ornans to Pontarlier, and are passing some of the wealthiest little communities in Franche-Comte, Montgesoye, Vuillafans, Lods, all most picturesque to behold, and important centres of industry.
The cens et rentes made up the only payment which the seigneur received each year, but there was another which became due at intervals. This was the payment known as the lods et ventes, a mutation fine which the seigneur had the right to demand whenever a farm changed hands by sale or by descent, except to direct heirs.
No longer does his position give him the authority of a magistrate; no longer must the habitants grind their corn at his mill; no longer can he claim lods et ventes when land is sold. For the loss of these rights he was paid compensation out of the public treasury. With the abolition of the seigniorial system ends too the story of the Nairne family.
To protect themselves the seigneur used his droit de retrait the right for forty days of himself taking the property at the price named. This involved vexation and delay and increased discontent. Moreover the seigneur's right to lods et ventes stood in the way of a ready transfer of property between members of the same family. There were other causes of discontent.
The cens et rentes were unduly raised, the droit de banalité was pressed to the extent that if a habitant went to a better or more convenient mill than the seignior's, he had to pay tolls to both, the transfer of property was hampered by the lods el ventes and the droit de retraite, and the claim always made by the seigniors to the exclusive use of the streams running by or through the seigniories was a bar to the establishment of industrial enterprise.
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