ABSTRACT
The fourth species of injury, that may be offered to one’s real property, is by waste, or destruction in lands and tenements. What shall be called waste was considered at large in a former volume,a as it was a means of forfeiture, and thereby of transferring the property of real estates. I shall therefore here only beg leave to remind the student, that waste is a spoil and destruction of the estate, either in houses, woods, or lands; by demolishing not the temporary profits only, but the very substance of the thing; thereby rendering it wild and desolate; which the common law expresses very significantly by the word vastum: and that this vastum, or waste, is either voluntary, or permissive; the one by an actual and designed demolition of the lands, woods, and houses; the other arising from mere negligence, and want of sufficient care in reparations, fences, and the like. So that my only business is at present to show, to whom this waste is an injury; and of course who is entitled to any, and what, remedy by action.
