DISTRIBUTION. The Damages under Lord Campbell's Act and Amendment Act, 9 and 10 Vict., c. 93; 27 and 28 Vict., c. 95, s. 2: payment into court: mode of distribution among widow and children of deceased.-The widow and administratrix of J. S., who was killed in a railway accident, brought an action against the railway company under Lord Campbell's Act, and the company paid £8,500 into court under the Amendment Act (27 and 28 Vict., c. 95, s 2), which the widow accepted in full. deceased left four infant children. The widow and children had been entirely dependent for their maintenance on the professional earnings of the deceased. A special case being presented to the Chancery Division for advice as to the proportion in which the compensation should be divided, held, that, by analogy to the statute of distributions, the widow should take one-third and the children the remaining two-thirds. Chancery Division, June 8, 1877. Sanderson v. Sanderson, 36 L. T. Rep. (N. S.) 847. FRAUD. Organization of corporation: fraudulent prospectus; non-disclosure of contract by promoters: measure of Section 38 damages: 30 and 31 Vict., c. 131, s. 38. of 30 and 31 Vict., c. 131, provides that "Every prospectus of a company, and every notice inviting persons to subscribe for shares in any joint-stock company, shall specify the dates and the names of the parties to any contract entered into by the company, or the promoters, directors, or trustees thereof, before the issue of such prospectus or notice, whether subject to adoption by the directors of the company or otherwise; and any prospectus or notice not specifying the same shall be deemed fraudulent on the part of the promoters, directors, and officers of the company knowingly issuing the same, as regards any person taking shares in the company on the faith of such prospectus, unless he shall have had notice of such contract." The contracts which must be disclosed to comply with this section are contracts which are calculated to influence persons reading a company's prospectus in making up their minds whether or not they will apply for shares in it. Therefore, where the promoters of a tramway company entered into agreements with the contractors for the company's works, by which the former were to receive large sums out of the contract price of the work, and these agreements were not disclosed in the prospectus, in an action brought by a shareholder against promoters to recover the amount paid for his shares, held, by the Common Pleas Division, that these agreements ought to have been disclosed; and held further, that the plaintiff was entitled to recover the amount claimed. In the Court of Appeal, held by Cockburn, C. J., and Brett, L. J., that the agreements were within the section, and ought to have been disclosed, Kelly, C. B., and Bramwell, L. J., dissenting. Held further, by Cockburn, C. J., and Bramwell and Brett, L. JJ., that, assuming the agreements to be within the section, the company being in liquidation, and a large debt on debentures being unpaid, there was sufficient evidence that the shares were of no value, and therefore the proper measure of damages was the sum paid for the shares, and the plaintiff was entitled to recover the full amount. Kelly, C. B., dissenting. Judgment of the Common Pleas Division affirmed. Common Pleas Division and Court of Appeal, June 2, 1877. Twycross v. Grant, 36 L. T. Rep. (N. S.) 812. INNKEEPER. Liability of: loss of property by guest: notice limiting liability: 26 and 27 Vict.. c. 41, ss. 1 and 3: contributory negligence. - Plaintiff was guest at an inn belonging to defendant, and, on going to bed, left his bedroom door unlocked. During the night a thief entered the room and stole property of plaintiff's to the value of £130. The property consisted of a gold watch and trinkets, which plaintiff had left on a chest of drawers near the door, and money which he had left in a pocket of his clothes. Plaintiff might have placed the property in the drawers and locked it up. By the 26 and 27 Vict., c. 41, s. 1, no innkeeper shall be liable to make good to his guest any loss or injury to property brought to his inn to a greater amount than £30, except when such property shall have been "stolen, lost, or injured through the willful act, neglect or default of such innkeeper, or any servant in his employ." Section 3 requires the innkeeper to exhibit a copy of section 1 in a conspicuous part of the entrance to his inn, in order to claim the protection of the statute. Defendant caused a notice purporting to be a copy of section 1 to be placed in the entrance was omitted. Plaintiff to his inn, but the word "act" sued defendant to recover the loss of his property, and defendant paid £30 into court. Held, (1) that the omission of the word "act" in the notice was material, and that the innkeeper was, therefore, not protected by the statute; (2) (reversing the decision of Kelly, C. B.) that there was evidence for the jury of contributory Court of Appeal, negligence on the part of plaintiff. June 26, 1877. Spice v. Bacon, 36 L. T. Rep. (N. S.) 896. RECENT AMERICAN DECISIONS. SUPREME COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA.* Husband and wife: curtesy: will: statute of frauds.— By the laws of Minnesota a married woman's property is held by her for her sole and separate use, “"but shall not be disposed of by her without the consent of her husband." A married woman domiciled in Minnesota, and owning real estate there and in Pennsylvania, made a will disposing specifically of her Pennsylvania property; the will was executed in Minnesota, under the hands and seals of wife and husband, "who hereby consents to and approves of the foregoing will." Held, that the husband was barred of his curtesy in the real estate in Pennsylvania. The will as to the husband was an instrument signed by the party to be bound, and was not obnoxious to the statute of frauds. His joinder in the will was a release of his curtesy, irrespective of the Minnesota laws. McBride's Estate. CORPORATE BONDS. Assignment of.-A bond of a corporation, payable to an obligee named or his assigns, is assignable under the act of May 28, 1715, so as to enable the assignee to sue in his own name. Such bond is assignable in equity by parol delivery, but an action on it cannot be maintained in the name of the assignee; the suit must be in the name of the obligee. Bunting's Administrators v. Camd. and Atlant. R. R. Co. LIFE INSURANCE. Insurable interest: parent and child.-The liability of a child under the poor laws for the support of a * To appear in 31 P. F. Smith's (81 Penn. St.) Reports. parent, with the natural feelings of affection produc- appellate, not passing upon questions of fact, and ing a desire to provide for the comfort of the parent, gives a right to the child to effect an insurance on the life of the parent. A child has an insurable interest in the life of a parent. The relationship prevents an insurance on a parent's life from being a gambling adventure. Reserve Mut. Ins. Co. v. Kane. NAVIGABLE WATERS. . comparatively seldom on those of practice, with its members free from nisi prius duties, the Court of Appeals is able to dispose of a much larger number of cases involving law questions, than any other tribunal of last resort. It has other advantages, namely, that of being sufficiently numerous to give decisions concurred in by all a great weight, that of holding its sessions in one place, where the very best facilities are afforded for investigation and consultation, that of reviewing no decision in which any of its members have taken part, and finally the not unimportant advantage of reviewing only decisions of appellate courts. These circumstances, with the additional one that the tenure of the judicial office is such, that those holding it are not liable to be affected by popular feel Rights of owners of land adjoining as to landings: obstructions. The plaintiffs, a ferry compuay from Bristol to Burlington, across the Delaware river, had "slips" into which they ran their boats on the side of wharves in those towns belonging to the defendants, a steamboat company, running on the river from Philadelphia to the same towns. The defendants' boats when moored at their wharves prevented the plain-ing, or by any other influence to which judges anxious tiffs' boats from going in and out. Held, that the defendants had the same right of navigation in front of the slips as in any part of the river, and to moor their boats in front of their wharf, but had no right willfully to obstruct the plaintiffs in the use of their slips. The question did not concern the right of navigation to the public in general, and to the parties in particular, but an unlawful privation of the land used, where private rights of property existed. Del. Riv. Steamboat Co. v. Burl. and Bristol Steam Ferry Co. RECORDER OF DEEDS. Liable for false certificate of search only to one employing him: knowledge.-The recorder of deeds is liable in damages for a false certificate of searches. The liability of the recorder is to the party who asks and pays for the certificate, not to his assigns or alienee. Leslie, desiring a loan from plaintiffs, to be secured by mortgage on his property, plaintiffs' conveyancer ordered searches for liens; through Leslie he procured a certificate from the recorder that there were no mortgages on the property; on this the loan was made to him. There being prior mortgages given by Leslie not certified, on the sale of Leslie's property by the sheriff the proceeds did not reach to pay the loan. Held, that the recorder was liable to plaintiffs for the loss. The employing Leslie to procure the certificate did not affect the plaintiffs with his knowledge. A principal is affected only by such knowledge of his agent as the agent acquired in the business in which he is employed. It is only during the agency that the agent represents and stands in the shoes of the principal; notice to him then is notice to the principal. The employment of Leslie to procure the certificate was not negligence on the part of the conveyancer imputable to the plaintiffs. Houseman v. Girard Mut. Build. and Loan Assoc. BOOK NOTICES. BARBOUR'S DIGEST OF NEW YORK REPORTS. Condensed Digest of the Decisions of the Court of Appeals and the Commission of Appeals of the State of New York, as reported in Tiffany's Reports, twelve volumes; Hand's Reports, six volumes; Keyes' Reports, four volumes; Sickles' Reports, 'seventeen volumes. Volumes XXVIII to LXII, inclusive, of the New York Reports. Vol. III. By Oliver L. Barbour, LL. D., author of treatises on Criminal Law, etc. Albany: Weare C. Little & Co., 1877. about the permanency of their position are supposed to be peculiarly susceptible, tend to render the cases decided by it of extraordinary value to the profession everywhere. The New York Reports, but a few months ago, were sixty-two in number, and the only digest which embraced merely the decisions contained therein, was one compiled by Mr. Tiffany, and which included the first twenty-seven volumes. The necessity for a digest of the remaining volumes has for several years been very apparent to the profession throughout the State, who have, in order to reach the decisions of the Court of Appeals, been driven to use digests embracing adjudications of every court, or else to look through the volumes seriatim. Some resorted to one plan, and some to another, the labor in each being about equal. We, therefore, welcomed the announcement some time since made, that Mr. Barbour was preparing a digest of those volumes of the New York Reports not covered by the work of Mr. Tiffany. The long experience of Mr. Barbour as a reporter gave assurance that the task would be accurately done, and the digest a concise and reliable statement of all the points adjudicated during the period covered by his volumes. The completed work, in every respect, meets our expectations, and we are confident that the profession will agree with us in saying that the digest is precisely what they were looking for. To those possessing the reports which it embraces, it will be indispensable, and to those who are not so fortunate, it will furnish in a small compass, and at a small cost, all that upon most occasions they really need from such reports. It should be found in every law office in the State, and we do not doubt that it will, in the course of a month or two, be found in all, except those of individuals who never purchase any books, but depend upon the libraries of their neighbors for information on matters of legal principle and practice. The volumes contain a table of cases digested, and an exhaustive index, and are well printed and bound. MINNESOTA REPORTS, VOL. XXII. Cases Argued and Determined in the Supreme Court of Minnesota, May, 1875-May, 1876. George B. Young, Reporter. St. Louis: Soule, Thomas & Wentworth, 1877. There is a number of valuable decisions of general interest in this volume, among which we will mention the following: Lee v. City of Minneapolis, p. 13: A municipal corporation is not liable a to real estate owner for consequential damages resulting from a change of street grade made by it. Newell v. Houlton, p. 19: It is not competent for parties to a contract to stipulate for a rate of interest after due, different from what the contract bears before due. State v. Kent, p. 41: A pew rent collector whose compensation was to be five per cent of all the rents collected, held not guilty of embezzlement in appropriating to his own use rents collected, he having a joint interest in such rents. Bates v. Clifford, p. 52: An agreement to pay $500 for a horse if one candidate for office was elected, and $150 if another, held a wager, and neither phase of the contract enforceable. McCarthy v. Niskern, p. 90: Exemplary damages are allowable against an innkeeper for turning a guest, who has paid for lodging, out of an inn, but $900 held excessive. Cogan v. Cook, p. 137: An agreement for a good and sufficient deed, free from all incumbrances, held to call for a deed sufficient not only in form, but to pass title free from incumbrance. Coleman v. Ballandi, p. 144: Exemption laws discriminating between different classes of creditors, held invalid. State v. Owens, p. 238: A woman upon whom the crime of abortion is committed, is not regarded as an accomplice. Anderson v. Morrison, p. 274: An employee who sets a minor servant to do a dangerous work is not liable for injuries done the minor while at such work, unless negligence was imputable to the employer in what he did. Shepard v. Allen, p. 283: An agreement to answer for the debt of another, if founded on a new consideration, is not within the statute, and is valid. Cotton v. M. & R. River Boom Co., p. 372: The power of eminent domain is not confined to taking for right of way. Pence v. Arbuckle, p. 417: A grantor executing and acknowledging a deed in blank, is estopped from setting up that the deed was not complete at the time of execution. Lusk v. Belote, p. 468: A boarder at an inn held not to be a traveler so as to make the innkeeper, as such, liable for the loss of such boarder's goods. The reporting in this volume is excellently done, and the book is well printed and bound. CORRESPONDENCE. "OLD FOGY AGAIN." To the Editor of the Albany Law Journal: SIR-Your correspondent, " Anti-Fogy," whose letter is published in your issue of the 8th inst., seems to be fully in accord with the theories upon which are defended the crudities of the New Code. He announces that his letter is written for the utter confusion of an Old Fogy, and he creates that confusion in a most astonishing way. He says: "Subdivision 4 of section 438 (and indeed all the remaining subdivisions of the section) is controlled by the opening clause of the section. That reads: An order directing the service of a summons upon a defendant without the State may be made in either of the following cases.' 'Subdivision 4. Where the defendant is a resident of the State,' etc. sentation of the proper complaint, and proof by affidavit of the additional facts required by the last section. The "additional facts" required to be proven are all enumerated in the subdivision. Certainly there is nothing requiring proof that the defendant is without the State. The question is as to the order that may be made. Section 440 describes the order. The order is that the summons be served by publication, or at the option of the plaintiff, by service of the summons, and of a copy of the complaint and order, upon the defendant personally, without the State." The plaintiff has at his option either one of the orders mentioned in the opening clause of section 438. Read the three sections "straight down" and it is impossible to find any requirement that proof be made that the defendant is out of the State, nor that the order be that he be served "without the State," if the plaintiff prefers to serve by publication instead of personally out of the State. Under the construction placed upon this statute by the learned gentleman, who has "read the Code carefully," a man of moderate mental resources might, perhaps, be embarrassed to know how to serve the summons, without the State, in the case provided for in latter part of subdivision 2, where a defendant "keeps himself concealed therein." Anti-Fogy, however, would feel no such embarrassment, for by his letter he shows that he reads statutes by dropping whole phrases when they stand in the way of any particular construction which he fancies may justify admiration of the New Code. OLD FOGY. TROY, N. Y., September 8, 1877. [We have received several other communications of like purport, but the foregoing presents all the points. -ED. A. L. J.] "A HINT TO AUTHORS." To the Editor of the Albany Law Journal: SIR- Please allow me the space in your JOURNAL to call the attention of our "legal authors" to the fact that there are certain law books which have heretofore been of great value and utility to our profession, which by reason of the many changes and modifications of the law have now become of much less value to the practitioner. I would suggest the necessity for a rewritten and remodeled edition of Dayton on Surrogates, Crary on Special Proceedings, and Wait's Law and Practice. There is great need for a revision of these works at once. Our new Code of Civil Procedure will necessitate a work on the Practice, which it is hoped some master mind and practical author will soon produce. In making many books there may be no end, but in needing many books there certainly is no end. PROGRESS. THE CRITICS OF THE NEW CODE. To the Editor of the Albany Law Journal: SIR-The new Code having, now in fact, become the law of the land, it is time to require that its critics should be correct in their statement of facts and logical in their deductions. The criticisms so far have, to a great extent, been simply a disgrace to the profession. Allow me to refer to a few of them. (1.) In your issue of September 1, Mr. Roswell J. Moss, of Elmira, doubtless aspiring to outstrip the famous Hall's two-moon discovery, propounds the question, whether under article 3, section 17, of the constitution, the new Code, or parts thereof, are not unconstitutional. Now had Roswell read his constitution through, especially section 25 of the same article, which provides that section 17 shall not apply to any portion of the revisers' work, he would have saved himself an unpardonable blunder. (2.) An essay some time ago was published by Messrs. Banks & Co., which John Norton Pomeroy, LL. D., dedicated to the bench and bar of the State. After overruling the Court of Appeals and other inferior tribuuals, by stating that the great reform created by the old Code was the abolition of all distinction between legal and equitable actions (which was not abolished thereby, and in the very nature of things cannot be abolished), he asserted (p. 13) that sections 69 and 140 of the old Code had been entirely omitted in the new, when in fact both were contained in sections 3303 and 518 of the revisers' second draft, and in sections 15 and 509 of the revisers' first draft, which was published and distributed to members of the bar more than three years before Mr. Pomeroy's essay appeared. He further stated (p. 12), that in cases where the defendants were not severally liable, the plaintiff, under the new Code, must succeed against all the defendants or be entirely defeated, when under sections 1932 and 1947 of the revisers' second draft, and sections 446 and 451 of the revisers' first draft, judgment might be taken against one or more joint debtors served as under section 136 of the old Code. See, also, sections 1204 and 1205. namely that the witness is not only an interested party, but also that the testimony of the witness cannot be rebutted. But neither of these reasons exist for excluding the testimony of a person convicted of crime simply, for his testimony can be rebutted and he is not an interested party. The reasons for the two laws, therefore, being entirely dissimilar, they cannot be inconsistent. But the article also asserts that the provisions of section 830 are retrogressive. Clearly not, they but carry out the principles lying at the foundation of section 829. The old Code was not only inconsistent in not containing a provision similar to section 830, but it was criminally so, if the expression may be used, for it permitted a husband to use that power, which he has ever exercised over the wife, to compel or induce her to commit a crime, to enforce a spurious claim for their mutual benefit, while it carefully guarded him from the commission of a similar offense. A law that simply protects the stronger is too absurd even for this unchivalric age. But not only is section 830 consistent with the old law revived in section 829, and not inconsistent with section 832, but section 832 is also in harmony with the recent amendments to the constitution contained in article 15, sections 2 and 3. The prevalent idea that the new Code is a new system of practice has undoubtedly biased the minds of a large portion of the profession, and occasioned much of the hasty and necessarily erroneous criticism upon it. It has even been stated that the new sup (3.) A prominent member of the State Bar Associa-plants the old Code. Nothing could be more incortion, after reading section 454 of the new Code, asked, whoever heard of the phrase, including the parties to bills of exchange and promissory notes." On looking at section 120 of the old Code, it was found that such a phrase had been in use, or rather existence, for about thirty years. rect. Prior to the new Code, the laws pertaining to practice were contained in the third part of the Revised Statutes and many subsequent statutes, chief among which was the old Code. The twenty-two chapters of the new Code simply bring together these various statutes into a systematic arrangement, thereby laying at rest, also, the often occurring question, as to how much of the Revised Statutes was superseded by the old Code. It is, therefore, erroneous to state that the new supplants the old Code, or any of the other statutes pertaining to practice, which it revises. True, it alters the phraseology of many statutes, and this may have been the cause of such erroneous impression; but such alterations were nec (4.) “Old Fogy," in his criticism upon section 438, subdivision 4, in your issue of August 18, omitted to state that section 439, as presented by the revisers to the legislature, provided, that upon an application for an order to serve summons by publication, in an action for divorce, it must appear that the plaintiff has been, or will be, unable, with due diligence, to make personal service, and that the legislature deliberately struck out this provision (see note to § 439, Weed, Par-essarily incident to the revision, as any one will at sons & Co.'s ed.). "Old Fogy" further complains therein that the defendant was not allowed, in such an action, to come in and defend after final judgmentby default. But such was the law under the old Code, section 134, and very properly too. (5.) One of that peculiar class of individuals who defineth the term "member of the liberal profession," to signify one that divideth his fees with his client, upon reading sections 73-76, was immediately in favor of abolishing a commission that proposed such strange and radical doctrines. But had he been a more faithful student of the law than of his client's wishes, or had he but remembered that there is nothing new under the sun, he would, doubtless, in a very short time have discovered the same identical provisions in 2 R. S. 288, §§ 71-74 (2 Edm. 298). (6.) The article in your issue of August 25, charging the revisers with inconsistency in framing sections 830 and 832, seems to me extremely illogical. Those two sections cannot be inconsistent, unless similar reasons exist for making the law the same in both cases. The reasons for the law contained in section 830 are the same as for that contained in section 829, once see by attempting the task himself, or by referring to the preface of the Revised Statutes of 1830, wherein the revisers state that they have changed the language of almost every statute revised. This change in the phraseology of many of the statutes revised has also given rise to much unnecessary complaint, for not only was it necessarily incideut to a revision, but it was also necessary in many cases in order to make the old Code say what it had been decided by the courts to mean. The chief characteristic of the old Code, as well as, I think, its chief virtue, was its extreme indefiniteness. It was impossible, at the outset, to definitely prescribe for all the cases that would arise in the revolution created by the old Code. It was necessary that it should be somewhat Delphic in character at first. But now the bar seems to think that all its oracles have been interpreted, and that the courts in hundreds of decisions have decided what it intended to say. Is it not, therefore, now eminently proper as well as professional to require the text to say what it means, instead of being required to lay the text aside and find its meaning in the decisions of the courts? The new Code bears the impress of faithful and laborious toil, and stands in striking contrast to the mushroom growths of these latter days. It is entitled to and will command the respect of every student, for its English and not Chinese conservatism, for its systematic arrangement, for its precision, conciseness and uniformity of style, for its almost unexampled typography, and as it indicates that the bar are waking up to the fact that if it is ever to recover its proud eminence in the past, it must modernize its weapons and save all useless study. THE Yours, respectfully, NOTES. R. J. and hired by him on the ordinary printed agreement that, until fully paid for, the hirer should be deemed a bailee only. Only two months' hire had been paid, and there were nine months due. Judge Miller said he only required the concurrence of Judge Harrison to put an effectual stop to this hiring system. Once for all, he might say, he was determined to put an end to the system. Judging from the advertisements in the daily press now, it would seem that every article in future was to be obtained on hire. That practice had gone far enough with regard to pianos, but at present sewing machines, watches, and all kinds of articles were advertised for procurement on this system. If parties were not able to purchase articles they had better do without them. This system must be stop HE September issue of the Journal of Jurispru-ped, or the clause in the act of Parliament might be dence and Scottish Law Magazine contains articles on these topics: Gavelkind, a peculiar tenure of land in the county of Kent; Scottish Prisons, past and present; A Procurator Fiscal, what he was, what he is, and what he will be; The Jurisdiction of the Local Courts in Ireland, Scotland and England compared: The position of Masters of Public Schools under the Education (Scotland) Act, 1872. The editorial departments of the present number do not compare favorably with those of former ones, and the cases reported are of very little general interest. struck out altogether. After some discussion Judge Miller said he would make no rule on the motion, without prejudice to the application being renewed on a future day. The following instances of whimsical wills appear in the New Castle (England) Chronicle: "Some years ago an English gentleman bequeathed to his two daughters their weight in £1 bank-notes. The eldest daughter got £51,200, and the younger £57,344. Here is a singular bequest by a Frenchman; it may truly be styled 'A new way to pay old debts.' Vaugeas, the famous French grammarian, was in the receipt of several pensions, but so prodigal was he in his liberalities, that he not only always remained poor, but was rarely out of debt, and finally acquired among his intimates the sobriquet of Le Hibou from his compulsory assumption of the habits of that bird, and We find it necessary to be extremely careful as to what we say about the new Code. Last week we referred to the fact that a correspondent had called our attention to an omission, in the new Code, of a requirement that undertakings be several, and we have since received eighty-one letters of correction, point-only venturing into the streets at night. His will coning out that section 812 provides that undertakings shall be "joint and several in form." The profession are obviously conning the Code to some purpose. In Coke upon Littleton" there is recorded a case of a man being his own executor. An ecclesiastic, civilly dead upon entering holy orders, left property to an abby, but becoming subsequently an abbot, he was civilly resuscitated, and the execution of the trusts of his own will devolved upon him. A somewhat analogous anomaly has just occurred in France. M. Savary, an ex-deputy, being a republican, was dismissed from the mayoralty of his commune. The deputy mayor, a republican also, refused to replace him. The prefect had then no other resource but to call upon the senior member of the municipal council to perform the functions of mayor. This senior member is no other than M. Savary, and he now signs all official acts as his own substitute in this form: "For Savary, the dismissed mayor, the senior member of the municipal council, Savary." There is no help for this.-London Daily News. Sewing machine contracts are coming into the English courts for adjudication, and they meet with no more favor there than here. Says a late issue of the Manchester (England) Guardian: In the Irish Bankruptcy Court, on the 17th ult., before Judge Miller, an application was made in Re Thomas Blackwell. The bankrupt had carried on business as a draper in North Earl street, Dublin. Mr. Collins applied on behalf of the Singer Machine Company for an order to give up a sewing machine found on the bankrupt's premises, tains much that is original, but the following is an especially characteristic clause. After disposing of all the little he possessed to meet the claims of his creditors, he adds: Still, as it may be found that eveu after the sale of my library and effects, these funds will not suffice to pay my debts, the only means I can think of to meet them is that my body should be sold to the surgeons on the best terms that can be obtained, and the product applied, as far as it will go, toward the liquidation of any sums it may be found I still owe; I have been of very little service to society while I lived, I shall be glad if I can thus become of any use after I am dead.' Whether the creditors accepted this well-intentioned bequest in part satisfaction of their claims is not recorded. I should have been pleased to have found that it was 'declined with thanks,' so that the poor savant's body might have gone in peace, instead of pieces, to its last resting-place. The following is an extract from the will of John Hylett Stow, proved in 1781: "I hereby direct my executors to lay out five guineas in the purchase of a picture of the viper biting the benevolent hand of the person who saved him from perishing in the snow, if the same can be bought for the money; and that they do, in memory of me, present it to ——, Esq., a King's counsel, whereby he may have frequent opportunities of contemplating on it, and by a comparison between that and his own virtue, be able to form a certain judgment which is best and most profitable, a grateful remembrance of past friendship and almost parental regard, or ingratitude and insolence. This I direct to be presented to him in lieu of a legacy of three thousands pounds I had by a former will, now revoked and burnt, left him.” |