HYPOTHEC(Hypotheca), in Roman law, is the most advanced form of the contract of pledge. A specific thing may be given absolutely to a creditor on the understanding that it is to be given back when the creditor’s debt is paid; or the property in the thing maybe assigned to the creditor while the debtor is allowed to remain in possession, the creditor as owner being able to take possession if his debt is not discharged. Here we have the kind of security known as pledge and mortgage respectively. In the hypotheca, the property does not pass to the creditor, nor does he get possession, but he acquires a preferential right to have his debt paid out of the hypothecated property; that is. he can sell it and pay himself out of the proceeds, or in default of a purchaser he can become the owner himself. The name and the principle have passed into the law of Scotland, which distinguishes between conventional hypothecs, as hottomry and respondentia, and tacit hypothecs established by law. Of the latter the most important is the landlord’s hypothec for rent (corresponding to distress in the law of England), which extends over the produce of the land and the cattle and sheep fed on it, and over stock and horses used in husbandry. The law of agricultural hypothec has long caused much discontent in Scotland; its operation was restricted by 30 & 31 Vict. c. 42, and finally by 43 Vict. c. 12 it has been enacted that the “landlord’s right of hypothec for the rent of land, including the rent of any buildings thereon, exceeding two acres in extent, let for agriculture or pasture, shall cease and determine.” As a set off the landlord is to have the same rights and remedies against a tenant when six months’ rent or twelve months’ rent is due and unpaid as he had formerly against ...