Note 102 — Chapter II · THE SEVEN PROVINCES OF SCOTLAND.

This word feodofirma, called feu-farm in Scotland and fee-farm in England, is usually understood as meaning what is inconsistently called a hereditary lease, but it was not so at least in Scotland. It was a grant of the feodum or fee of the estate, and not merely of the usufruct, burdened with an annual payment of a firma or census, instead of military service.—See Fordun, vol. ii. p. 414 note.