The villain is in no way to be considered as the owner of the plot of land he occupies; his power of disposing of it is stinted accordingly, and he is subjected to constant control from the real owner. He cannot fell timber; oaks and elms are reserved to the lord[333]. He cannot change the cultivation of the land of his own accord; it would be out of the question, for instance, to turn a garden-close into arable without asking for a licence[334]. He is bound to keep hedges and ditches in good order, and is generally responsible for any deterioration of his holding. When he enters into possession of it, he has to find a pledge that he will perform his duties in a satisfactory manner[335]. There can be no thought of a person so situated alienating the land by an act of his own will; he must surrender it into the hand of the lord, and the latter grants it to the new holder after the payment of a fine. The same kind of procedure is followed when a tenement is passed to the right heir in the lifetime of the former possessor[336]. A default in paying rents or in the performance of services, and any other transgression against the interests of the lord, may lead to forfeiture[337]. The lord takes also tenements into his hand in the way of escheat, in the absence of heirs. Court-rolls constantly mention plots which have been resumed in this way by the lord[338]. The homage has to report to the steward as to all changes of occupation, and as to the measures which are thought necessary to promote the interests of the landowner and of the tenantry[339]. [Tenure by rent considered free; tenure by agricultural work, servile.] As to the treatment of tenure in manorial documents, it is to be noticed that a distinction which has no juridical meaning at all becomes all important in practice. At common law, as has been said repeatedly, the contrast between free land and servile land resolves itself into a contrast between precarious occupation and proprietary right. This contrast is noticed occasionally and as a matter of legal principle by manorial documents[340] quite apart from the consequences which flow from it, and of which I have been speaking just now. But in actual life this fundamental feature is not very prominent; all stress is laid on the distinction between land held by rent and land held by labour. In the common phraseology of surveys and manorial rolls, the tenements on which the rent prevails over labour are called 'free tenements,' and those on the contrary which have to render labour services, bear the names of 'servile holdings.' This fact is certainly not to be treated lightly as a mere result of deficient classification or terminology. It is a very important one and deserves to be investigated carefully.