Dower (la dot) is what the wife brings to the husband in marriage, and it may be either by donation from another or by a settlement of the wife upon herself, and it may extend to all the present or future property of the wife, but cannot be constituted or augmented during marriage. The parties may stipulate for a community of future acquisitions only. The husband has the management of dotal property, but is accountable as a usufructuary, and in case it be put in peril, the wife may obtain a separation of goods.—The English law of dower has recently undergone very great changes. By statute 3 and 4 William IV., c. 105, the widow is not entitled to dower of lands which the husband has disposed of in his lifetime, or by will. All charges by will, and all debts and encumbrances to which the estate of the husband is subject, take priority of dower; and dower is made subject to any restrictions which the husband may impose by will. But on the other hand, the wife is entitled to equitable dower of any beneficial interest of the husband which shall amount to an estate of inheritance in possession, except joint tenancy; and no gift of personal property by the husband can invalidate the right to dower, unless expressly so declared by will. This modification of the law of dower has probably grown out of the general custom prevailing in England among land proprietors of making marriage settlements. In cases where this is omitted, the wife still has some provision under the statute of distribution (29 Charles II.), which gives her one third of the personal estate of the husband when he dies intestate, not for life merely, but absolutely.—In the United States, the general rule prevails of allowing to the widow an estate for life in one third of all the lands of which the husband was seized in fee. To give the right, however, the seisin of the husband must be a beneficial one, and not merely as trustee or for the use of another, and the marriage must be legal, or if voidable, must not have been set aside during the husband's life. The wife may be barred of her dower in various modes; as: 1, by an old statute of Edward I., which has been recognized in some of the states and not in others, elopement from the husband, and living with an adulterer; 2, acceptance of a jointure or of a provision made by will in lieu thereof; 3, divorce, for in general the marriage must continue until the husband's death, though in some states it is provided that if divorce is had for the husband's misconduct, the wife shall be immediately endowed as if he were dead; 4, joining with the husband in a conveyance of the lands under the statute formalities. This last is the most usual mode, but if the conveyance be by way of mortgage, the wife shall have dower subject to the mortgage. Dower should be assigned to the widow by the husband's heir or alienee within the widow's quarantine, which originally was 40 days, but now by statutes is greatly enlarged, during which she may continue to occupy the mansion house; but if he fail to do so, or make an assignment which she thinks unjust, she may recover by suit. The profits issuing out of lands are subject to dower, as well as the lands themselves, and assignment of dower in such cases is made by setting out one third the annual proceeds during the widow's life. The law of dower has recently undergone many changes in different states. In several the wife now has dower only in the lands of which the husband died seized; in others, though the husband's several conveyance does not bar dower, a judicial sale for the enforcement of a debt or a contract against him will do so; in others still the estate is enlarged and made an estate in fee, instead of for life only. The share which the widow takes in the personal property is not called dower, and there is no uniformity in the statutes on that subject.
DOWLER, Bennet, an American physician and physiologist, born in Ohio co., Va., April 16, 1797. He was educated at the university of Maryland, where in 1827 he received the degree of doctor of medicine. In 1836 he settled in New Orleans, and was for several years the editor of the “New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal.” From an early period in his career experiments upon the human body, immediately or very soon after death, occupied a large share of his attention, and the results of his investigations, comprising some important discoveries with regard to contractility, calorification, capillary circulation, &c., were published in 1843-'4. Since that time these and other original experiments have been extended, generalized, and analyzed by him. His researches on animal heat, in health, in disease, and after death, which have from time to time been published in medical journals, have led to important discoveries, particularly with reference to post mortem calorification, which his experiments have shown will, after death from fever, cholera, or sunstroke, &c., rise in some cases much higher than its antecedent maximum during the progress of the disease. In 1845 Dr. Dowler commenced a series of experiments in comparative physiology on the great saurian or alligator of Louisiana, which he regarded as better for the purpose than any of the cold-blooded animals usually selected for vivisection. From these experiments he was led to the conclusions that after decapitation the head, and more especially the trunk, afford evidences of possessing the faculties of sensation and volition for hours after a complete division of the animal; that the headless trunk, deprived of all the senses but that of touch, still retains the powers of perception and volition, and may act with intelligence in removing or avoiding an irritant; and that the functions and structures of the nervous system constitute a unity altogether inconsistent with the anatomical assumption of four distinct and separate sets of nerves, and a corresponding fourfold set of functions.
