The principles to be applied in carrying out a sale of land registered under the Land Transfer Acts, 1875 and 1897 (a), depend upon the provisions of these statutes and the rules made thereunder (b), and especially upon the effect thereby given to first registration under the Acts, and to registered transfers and charges of registered land (c). It would be out of place in a work like the present to give a general description of the system of a registration of title established by these statutes. A short account of it is contained in the writer's last edition of "Williams on Real Property" (d), and it will be assumed that the reader has a general acquaintance with the statutory provisions in question. We will here confine our attention to the sale of registered land, and will follow the plan, previously adopted with respect to the general law of sale (e), of endeavouring to ascertain what are the provisions of an open contract for the sale of registered land.

Land registered under the Land Transfer Acts.

In the first place, it may be noted that contracts to sell registered land are not capable of registration nor required to assume any special form. They are governed by the general law relating to the formation of contract (f). They must, of course, conform with the requirements of the Statute of Frauds (g), and, subject to the express enactments of the Land Transfer Acts (h), they appear to incorporate the terms implied by law in any other contract for the sale of land (i), including the provisions annexed to sales of land by the Vendor and Purchaser Act, 1874 (k), and the Conveyancing Act of 1881 (l). The express enactments of the Land Transfer Acts regulating contracts for the sale of registered land are the following: Contracts to sell registered land.

(a) Stats. 38 & 39 Vict. c. S7; 60 & 61 Vict. c. 65.

(b) See Land Transfer Rules, 1903.

(c) See stats. 33 & 39 Vict, c. 87, ss. 7 - 9, 13, 22, 25 - 27, 31, 32, 35; 60 & 61 Vict. c. 65, First Schedule; Land Transfer Rules (1903), 52 - 59, 140 - 142; Wins. Real Prop. 622 - 633, 19th ed.

(d) Part VII., pp. 616 sq., 19th ed.

(e) Above, pp. 26 sq.

(Land Transfer Act, 1897 (m), s. 16, sub-s. 1.) A purchaser of registered land shall not require any evidence of title, except (i) the evidence to be obtained from an inspection of the register, or of a certified copy of or extract from the register;

(ii) a statutory declaration as to the existence or otherwise of matters which are declared by sect. 18 of the principal Act (n), and by this Act, not to be incumbrances (o);

Proof of title, which can be required on purchase of registered land.

Matters declared not to be incumbrances.

(f) Above, pp. 1 - 25.

(g) Stat. 29 Car. II. c. 3, s. 4; above, pp. 3 sq.

(h) See stat. 60 & 61 Vict. c. 65, ss. 8 (2, 3), 16, stated below.

(i) Above, pp. 27 - 29, 33 - 45; and see p. 81 and n. (y).

(k) Stat. 37 & 38 Vict. c. 78, ss. 1, 2.

(l) Stat. 44 & 45 Vict. c. 41, s. 3.

(m) Stat. 60 & 61 Vict. c. 65.

(n) The Land Transfer Act, 1875; stat. 38 & 39 Vict. c. 87.

(o) By stat. 38 & 39 Vict. c. 87, s. 18, as amended by 60 & 61 Vict. c. 65, First Schedule, all registered land shall, unless under the provisions of the Acts the contrary is expressed on the register, be deemed to be subject to such of the following liabilities, rights and interests as may be for the time being subsisting in reference thereto, and such liabilities, rights and interests shall not be deemed incumbrances within the meaning of the Acts (that is to say):

(1) Liability to repair highways by reason of tenure, quit rents, Crown rents, heriots and other rents and charges having their origin in tenure; and

(2) Succession duty, estate duty, land tax, tithe rentcharge and payments in lieu of tithes or of tithe rentcharge; and

(3) Rights of common, rights of sheepwalk, rights of way, watercourses, and rights of water, and other easements; and (iii) if the proprietor of the land is registered with an

Where title absolute.

(4) Rights to mines and minerals created previously to the registration of the land or the 1st of January, 1898; and

(5) Rights of entry, search, and user, and other rights and reservations incidental to or required for the purpose of giving full effect to the enjoyment of rights to mines and minerals, or of property in mines or minerals, and created previously to the registration of the land or the 1st of January, 1898; and

(6) Rights of fishing and sporting, seignorial and manorial rights of all descriptions, and franchises exercisable over the registered lands; also liability to repair the chancel of any church, liability in respect of embankments and river walls, and drainage rights, customary rights, public rights, and profits a prendre; and

(7) Leases or agreements for leases and other tenancies for any term not exceeding twenty-one years, or for any less estate, in cases where there is an occupation under such tenancies; also, subject to the provisions of the Land Transfer Act, 1897 (see sect. 12), rights acquired or in course of being acquired under the Limitation Acts:

Provided as follows:

(a) Where it is proved to the satisfaction of the registrar that any land registered, or about to be registered, is exempt from land tax or tithe rentcharge, or from payments in lieu of tithes or of tithe rent-charge, the registrar may notify the fact on the register in the prescribed manner (see Land Transfer Rules (1903), 212); and

(b) The Commissioners of Inland Revenue shall, upon the application of the proprietors of any land registered or about to be registered, upon such declaration being made, or such other evidence being produced as the Commissioners require, and upon payment of the prescribed fee, grant a certificate that at the date of the grant thereof no succession duty is owing in respect of such land, and the registrar shall in the prescribed manner notify such fact on the register, and such notification shall be conclusive evidence of the fact so notified in respect of succession duty (see, however, stat. 60 & 61 Vict. c. 65, s. 13, which appears to supersede this provision); and