CAPE SABLE COMPANY'S CASE.—3 BLAND. 619

general role, it has always * been the course of this Court,
in all cases, where a sale of real estate has been made under 641
its order or decree, to have a delivery of the possession so made
as to insure the safety of the then growing crops. Doe v. Wither-
wick, 11 Com. Laic Sep. 8; Rawlings v. Cat-roll, 1 Bland, 75, note
Dorsey v. Campbell, I Bland, 304; Tyson v. Hollingsworth, 2 Bland,
334, note.

The Statute of 1732, which subjects land to be taken in execu
tion and sold for the payment of debts, makes no distinction be-
tween real and personal estate 5 Geo. 2, c. 7; Coombs v. Jordan,
ante, 284. And I know of no case, in this State, in which it has
been held or even intimated, that in executing a writ of fieri facias,
the plaintiff or the sheriff was under any, the least obligation to
endeavor to obtain satisfaction first out of the personal estate of
the defendant. Hanson v. Barnes, 3 G. & J. 367; Osborne v. Wood-
son, 1 Haywood, 24. Yet as the ancient common law did make
such a distinction; and as the personal estate is, in many respects,
considered by our law as the primary and natural fund for the pay
ment of debts; Hammond v. Hammond, 2 Bland, 347; Clanmorris

execution, in favor of husbandry, excepts his oxen and beasts of the
plough.

By an Act of the Provincial Government, it is set forth, that " whereas
many of the inhabitants of this Province are and have been exceedingly
grieved and burthened by executions laid upon them in the summer time,
when it is not possible for them to procure effects for the payment and satis-
faction of their creditors, by means whereof they are often times kept in
prison a long time, and thereby disabled from making and tending their
crops, to the great prejudice. If not ruin., of many of the inhabitants of this
Province, being thereby left destitute of any means to satisfy their credi-
tors."— 1715, ch. 33.—And by another Act it is declared, that no slave shall
be sold by any administrator for the payment of debts; nor any execution
served upon any slave so long as there shall be other goods of the deceased
sufficient to satisfy the debt, but shall be kept and employed for the benefit
of the creditors and orphans, until the crop begun in the life-time of the de-
ceased, shall be finished.—1715, ch. 39, s. 8.

By a British Statute passed about the year 1816, for the purpose of regu-
lating the execution of legal process, so as to be consistent with good hus-
bandry, it is enacted, that the sheriff shall not carry off, or sell for the pur-
pose of being carried off from any lands, let to farm, any straw, threshed
or unthreshed, or any straw of crops growing, or any chaff, colder, or any
turnips, or any manure, compost, ashes, or sea-weed, in any case whatever;
nor after notice, any hay or vetches, nor any roots or vegetables being the
produce of such lands, where, according to any written agreement with the
landlord, the same is to be expended thereon: but shall sell the same under
certain regulations, to be there used and expended, according to the custom
of the country or according to the written agreement, as the case may be.
And by the sixth section of this statute, all crops and produce so sold, and
all cattle and implements of husbandry employed and used in and about the
same, are protected from distress.-36 Geo. 3. c. 50; Bradby on Distress, 84;
Watson on the Office of Sheriff, 180.