heritage for ever, as freely as any freeman (_liber homo_) can grant land; and Alexander Cumyn, Earl of Buchan, grants to Fergus, son of John de Fothes, the tenement of Fothes, with its bondmen, bondages, native-men, and their followers, to be held of himself and his heirs in fee and heritage for ever, as freely as any freeman (_liber homo_) can hold (_tenet_) any tenement of any earl or baron within the kingdom, rendering such form in service to the king as pertains to their lands, and a half-pound of wax to us and our heirs in lieu of all secular service or demand which we can exact in future.[307]. This class appears to be meant by the _Ogethearn_ of the old laws, who ranked next after the thane.[308] The second of Fordun’s groups consists of those whom he terms _liberi et generosi_, who held portions of land either for ten or for twenty years or during life, with remainder to one or two heirs. These were the tenants in the modern sense of the term. The former were the _liberi firmarii_ of the statutes, or free farmers, and the latter the kindlie tenants or tacksmen, who were usually near relations of the lord of the land, and when they had a liferent possession of land, occupied an intermediate position between the _libere tenentes_ or freeholders and the _firmarii_ or farmers, and may in fact be classed with either.[309] We find in this group a resemblance to the _Ceile_ or tenants of the Irish Laws in two respects. First, in the steelbow tenancy, by which many of these tenants held their land, and were sometimes called steelbow-men. By this tenure the landlord provided the stock and implements called steelbow goods, which were transferred to the tenant on valuation; and he was bound on the termination of his lease to return stock and implements to the same value, while the rent paid for the land was higher in proportion to the value of the steelbow goods. Secondly, the smallest possession held by a free farmer appears to have been two bovates or oxgangs of land, or the fourth of a ploughgate, called in some parts of the country a husband-land; and we find that in the north of Scotland the name of _Rath_ was given to this portion of land, a name which in the Irish Laws signified the homestead, which formed the lowest single tenancy. Thus William, son of Bernard, grants to the monks of Arbroath ‘two bovates of land, which are called _Rath_ (_que vocantur Rathe_), of the territory of Katerlyn (in Kincardineshire), with the right to pasture twenty beasts and four horses on the common pasture of Katerlyn; and the same person grants to the monks two other bovates of land in the territory of Katerlyn, consisting of seven acres of land adjoining their land which is called _Rathe_, on the north, and nineteen acres of land adjoining these seven acres on the seaside towards the east, under that culture which is termed _Treiglas_, thus making up the twenty-six acres of which a husbandland consisted.’[310] The word _Rath_