5 From this it appears that free men not subject to your power, or whom you do not possess in good faith, and other persons' slaves, of whom you are neither usufructuaries nor just possessors, cannot under any circumstances acquire for you; and this is the meaning of the maxim that a man cannot be the means of acquiring anything for one who is a stranger in relation to him. To this maxim there is but one exception--namely, that, as is ruled in a constitution of the Emperor Severus, a free person, such as a general agent, can acquire possession for you, and that not only when you know, but even when you do not know of the fact of the acquisition: and through this possession ownership can be immediately acquired also, if it was the owner who delivered the thing; and if it was not, it can be acquired ultimately by usucapion or by the plea of long possession. 6 So much at present concerning the modes of acquiring rights over single things: for direct and fiduciary bequests, which are also among such modes, will find a more suitable place in a later portion of our treatise. We proceed therefore to the titles whereby an aggregate of rights is acquired. If you become the successors, civil or praetorian, of a person deceased, or adopt an independent person by adrogation, or become assignees of a deceased's estate in order to secure their liberty to slaves manumitted by his will, the whole estate of those persons is transferred to you in an aggregate mass. Let us begin with inheritances, whose mode of devolution is twofold, according as a person dies testate or intestate; and of these two modes we will first treat of acquisition by will. The first point which here calls for exposition is the mode in which wills are made. TITLE X. OF THE EXECUTION OF WILLS The term testament is derived from two words which mean a signifying of intention. 1 Lest the antiquities of this branch of law should be entirely forgotten, it should be known that originally two kinds of testaments were in use, one of which our ancestors employed in times of peace and quiet, and which was called the will made in the comitia calata, while the other was resorted to when they were setting out to battle, and was called procinctum. More recently a third kind was introduced, called the will by bronze and balance, because it was made by mancipation, which was a sort of fictitious sale, in the presence of five witnesses and a balance holder, all Roman citizens above the age of puberty, together with the person who was called the purchaser of the family. The two first-mentioned kinds of testament, however, went out of use even in ancient times, and even the third, or will by bronze and balance, though it has remained in vogue longer than they, has become partly disused.