Scottish Court of Session Decisions

Subject_1Entail
Subject_2Improvement Expenditure on Entailed Estate
Subject_3What included under.
Facts:

Lord Dalhousie, the institute in possession of an entailed estate, executed various improvements upon it under a clause in the deed of entail which declared that if he or any heir in possession should at any time lay out money “in enclosing, trenching, planting, or draining, or in erecting farmhouses and offices for the improvement of any of the lands and estates thereby disponed, or in making roads, and building bridges, or in repairing or making additions to the mansion-houses or offices of Brechin Castle or of Panmure,” the party so laying out money might constitute as a debt against succeeding heirs of entail three-fourths of the money so expended. Held, in an action at his instance (during the dependence of which he died, and his trustees and executors were sisted in his room) brought against the succeeding heir of entail for payment of three-fourths of the money so expended, that under the above clause there fell to be included—(1) cottages for farm-servants; (2) a sum paid to a tenant towards the expense of erecting a new steading, it having been found impossible to carry out an agreement in the lease to repair; but (3) ( rev. the Lord Ordinary—Rutherfurd Clark) that repairs executed on a thrashing-mill—consisting of a new dam and drain, for laying pipes, a new mill-course, and other apparatus, — were not so comprehended.