APPENDIX H 68i When once the existence of the principle of abeyance is admitted, it is, of course, easy to project its operation into the remote past and to interpret what happened in the light of such a principle. We can therefore see in the succession of one of several coheirs to an earldom the determination of an abeyance; but for centuries what we now call the rights of the heirs general were unknown. The fact is that when the creation of earldoms in fee was discontinued and the ancient law became obsolescent, the descent of an earldom to coheirs caused perplexity. The Sovereign, however, as the tountain of honour, naturally assumed that when the descent of a dignity which originated in the royal favour was arrested through this cause, all rights to it lapsed to the Crown. 86
