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*  361  OF  REAL  PROPERTY.  [Part  VL

[  *  850  ]  issue,  to  the  right  heirs  of  the  settlor.  The  *  estate  is
subject  to  a  variety  of  charges  for  family  purposes,  and
acts  of  ownership  become  necessary  in  relation  to  the  estate,  and
to  the  objects  of  the  settlement  This  requires  the  introduction
of  powers  of  leasing,  selling,  exchanging,  and  charging  the  lands,
and  with  the  reservation  of  a  power  to  alter  and  modify  the  dis-
positions in  the  settlement,  as  exigencies  may  require.  It  is  done
by  a  general  power  of  appointment  in  the  first  instance,  or  by
adding  to  the  limitations  a  power  of  revocation  and  new  appoint-
ment    Powers  are  the  main  spring  of  this  machinery  (a).
The  doctrine  of  settlements  has  thus  become,  in  England,  an
abstruse  science,  which  is,  in  a  great  degree,  monopolized  by  a
select  body  of  conveyancers,  who,  by  means  of  their  technical  and
verbose  provisions,  reaching  to  distant  contingencies,  have  ren>
dered  themselves  almost  inaccessible  to  the  skill  and  curiosity  of
the  profession  at  large.  Some  of  the  distinguished  property
lawyers' have  acknowledged,  that  the  law  of  entails,  in  its  present
mitigated  state,  and  great  comparative  simplicity,  was  even
preferable  to  these  executory  limitations  upon  estates  in  fee.
