Browsing: Legal Papers of John Adams, Volume 1

7. The statute is 21 Jac. 1, c. 16, §§1, 2 (1623). Ejectment might also have failed because some of the lands in dispute had apparently been conveyed under the administrator's deed to Joshua Morse. Whiting might have raised the defense of ius tertii (a superior right in a third party), which was good in ejectment, but not in a real action. Moreover, since Whiting in all likelihood was not the original wrongful entrant, Abiel's right of entry might also have been “tolled by descent,” that is, lost by the passage of the property to the heir of the original abator. See 3 Holdsworth, History of English Law 89–90; 7 id. at 20–21, 61–69; Charles Runnington, Action of Ejectment 12–13 (London, 1781); Jackson, Real Actions 5–6.