The horse and arms which, in the strict theory of the comitatus, had been the gift, or rather the loan of the chief, were to be returned at the death of the vassal, in order, according to the same theory, that they might furnish some other adventurer with the instruments of service[315]. These, technically called Heregeatwe, _armatura bellica_, have continued even to our own day under the name of Heriot, and strictly speaking consist of horses and weapons. In later imitation of this, the unfree settlers on a lord’s land, who were not called upon by their tenure to perform military service, were bound on demise to pay the best chattel (_melius catallum_, _best head_, in German beste haupt, heriot-custom, as opposed to heriot-service) to the lord, probably on the theoretical hypothesis that he, at the commencement of the tenancy, had supplied the necessary implements of agriculture. And this differs entirely from a Relief[316], because Heriot is the act of the leaving, Relief the act of the incoming tenant or heir[317]; and because in its very nature and amount Heriot is of a somewhat indefinite character, but Relief is not. ----- Footnote 314: Leg. Ælfr. Introduction, and § 4. Footnote 315: This is necessary in a country where the materials of which weapons are fabricated are not abundant, which Tacitus notices as the case in Germany, “ne ferrum quidem superest, sicut ex genere telorum colligitur.” Germ. vi. Adventurers, ever on the move, are prone to realize their gains in the most portable shape. Kings, gems and arms are the natural form, and a Teutonic king’s treasury must have been filled with them, in preference to all other valuables. Footnote 316: Relief, _relevium_, from _relevare_, to lift or take up again. It is a sum paid by the heir to the lord, on _taking_ or _lifting up again_ the inheritance of an estate which has, as it were, fallen to the ground by the death of the ancestor. Footnote 317: Fleta, lib. iii. cap. 18. -----