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THE ROMANCE OF WILLS AND TESTAMENTS
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
SONGS AND LYRICAL POEMS
(1908)
_In Preparation_
SPIRITUAL TESTAMENTS
OR
PRAYERS AND PREFACES FROM
WILLS, &c.
THE
ROMANCE OF WILLS
AND TESTAMENTS
BY
EDGAR VINE HALL
T. FISHER UNWIN
LONDON: ADELPHI TERRACE
LEIPSIC: INSELSTRASSE 20
1912
(_All rights reserved._)
“My Life’s my dying day, wherein I still
Am making, alter and correct my Will.”
FRANCIS QUARLES.
“Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land.”
CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.
“Of Carthage wall I was a stone
O’h Mortals Read with Pity
Time consumes all it spareth none
Man, Mountain, Town nor City.
Therefore O’h Mortals now bethink
You where unto you must,
Since now such Stately Buildings
Lie Buried in the dust.
THOMAS HUGHES, 1663.”
_The Carthage Stone, S. Dunstan’s Church, Stepney._
PREFACE
By way of preface it is necessary to explain the sources from which
the material for the following pages is taken. The chief feature of
these essays consists, I think, in the large amount of original matter
rescued from the multitudinous MS. volumes of wills, &c., which are
preserved at Somerset House and elsewhere.
As in death, so in those volumes, small and great rest side by side.
Of the majority their wills, or, if they died without wills, their
intestacies, are their only memorials. But it is fascinating to come
suddenly upon some well-known name. In a volume of intestacies of
the year 1674, for instance, is an entry stating that administration
was granted to Elizabeth Milton, widow of John Milton, late of the
parish of St. Giles, Cripplegate, his nuncupative will not having been
proved—“testamento nuncupativo dicti defuncti ... per antedictam
Elizabetham Milton allegato nondum probato.”
Different types and times, the lighter or the more serious pages of
this book, will appeal to different readers. I would, for my part,
especially suggest attention to wills illustrative of times of plague
as likely to interest students of human nature and history. Time and
opportunity for research have been limited—not unfortunately, perhaps.
Amid greater abundance of material, choice would have been the more
perplexing.
It is desired to make full acknowledgment of the various printed books
which I have perused, and from which I have sometimes borrowed, viz.:
such books as “Wills from Doctors’ Commons” (Nichols and Bruce), “Fifty
English Wills” (Furnivall), “North Country Wills” (Surtees Society),
“Testamenta Eboracensia” (Surtees Society), “Testamenta Vetusta”
(Nicolas), “Testamenta Cantiana” (Duncan and Hussey), “Wells Wills”
(Weaver), “Lincoln Wills” (Gibbons), “Royal Wills” (Nichols), “A
History of English Law” (Holdsworth).
Again, there are books, not directly connected with the subject, in
which wills or pertinent tales occur. In this class I am indebted to
such books as Messrs. Maclehose’s edition of “An Historical Relation
of Ceylon” (Robert Knox), “Anna Van Schurman” (Una Birch), “Bygone
Leicestershire” (Andrews), “The Old Sea-Port of Whitby” (Gaskin),
“Beckenham Past and Present” (Borrowman), “Walks in Islington”
(Cromwell), “_Gentleman’s Magazine_,” “Table Book” (Hone), “London”
(Knight), “Ancient Monuments” (Weever), “Seventeenth Century Men
of Latitude” (George), “Ancestral Stories and English Eccentrics”
(Timbs), “Haunted Houses” (Harper), “Real Ghost Stories” (Stead),
“Naturalisation of the Supernatural” (Podmore), “Dreams and Ghosts”
(Lang), “Folk Lore and Folk Stories of Wales” (Trevelyan), “_The Annals
of Psychical Science_,” and “_The Occult Review_.”
Especial acknowledgment is due to Messrs. Constable and Co. for
permission to make use of articles in “_The Ancestor_”; to Mr. C.
L. Kingsford and the Delegates of the Oxford University Press for
permission to introduce the story of the last days of Elizabeth Stow,
as contained in Mr. Kingsford’s Introduction to his edition of Stow’s
“Survey”; and to Mr. R. de M. Rudolf for valuable illustrations drawn
from his book, “Clapham Before 1700 A.D.”
The idea of this book is the writer’s own. It was inevitable that the
idea should have been anticipated, but of such anticipation I was
unaware until the book was under weigh. The nearest approaches which I
have read are Mrs. Byrne’s “Curiosities of the Search Room: A Collection
of Serious and Whimsical Wills” (1880), and Walter Tegg’s “Wills of
Their Own: Curious, Eccentric, and Benevolent” (1876), to both of which
I acknowledge indebtedness. But those who are interested should repair,
if possible, to their entertaining pages. An earlier anticipatory
volume is G. Peignot’s excellent “Choix de Testamens Anciens et
Modernes, Remarquables par leur Importance, leur Singularité, ou leur
Bizarrerie” (1829).
Since these essays were written Mr. Virgil M. Harris, of St. Louis,
Missouri, has published at Boston, U.S.A., a large collection of wills
under the title, “Ancient, Curious, and Famous Wills,” a work, however,
distinct in scope and style from the present book.
Scattered about these pages are instances of wills, &c., gathered
from newspapers from time to time. This source, also, is gratefully
recognised. Lastly, I have to express my thanks to Mr. Fincham, of
Somerset House, for affording me facilities to introduce two or three
excellent illustrations of my theme.
Other references are mentioned in the text. If any work to which I am
indebted in any respect has not been acknowledged, I trust I may be
accorded a ready pardon.
E. VINE HALL.
_Wimbledon._
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
PREFACE 7
I. THE ROMANCE OF WILLS 13
II. WILLS NOT FULFILLED 59
III. DR. JOHNSON’S WILL 69
IV. DEATH-BED DISPOSITIONS 82
V. WILLS BY WORD OF MOUTH 93
VI. THE POLYCODICILLIC WILL 106
VII. EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY PIETY 113
VIII. THE DEAD HAND 123
IX. WILLS OF FANCY AND OF FANTASY 134
X. STRIFE 148
XI. LOVE AND GRATITUDE 159
XII. THE SERVANT PROBLEM 169
XIII. ANIMALS AND PETS 178
XIV. THE WAY OF ALL FLESH 187
XV. BURIALS AND FUNERALS 197
XVI. WILLS AND GHOSTS 230
The Romance of Wills and Testaments
CHAPTER I
THE ROMANCE OF WILLS
I
“The older I grow,” Mr. E. V. Lucas has said, “the less, I find, do I
want to read about anything but human beings.... But human beings, as
human beings, are not enough; they must, to interest me, have qualities
of simplicity or candour or quaintness.”
The words of the writer are peculiarly apt to describe the charm of
wills. But the older we grow, the more do men and women, by reason
only of their humanity, absorb our interest. In wills human nature is
most vividly and variously displayed. In wills the dead speak, and
in a manner live again. The poor and the rich, men learned and men
illiterate, all alike have made interesting wills. In some cases humour
and pathos are more unconscious, in others opportunity for effect is
greater; but in wills of every class, and of every age or form, there
is much worthy of remark.
Historically they are invaluable records. In them are reflected all
social, political, and religious revolutions. By them the history of
families or places is preserved and illuminated. As long ago as the
sixteenth century John Stow realised their value, and often referred
to them in his “Survey of London.” No local record to-day would be
complete without the wills of its worthies.
There is unrivalled scope for the imagination in perusing the last
dispositions of the dead. How easy it is, with these documents before
us, to picture the figures of each generation; the fervent Catholic
of the fifteenth century, the pious benefactor of the sixteenth, the
“heroic English gentleman” of the seventeenth, the Whig or Tory of
the eighteenth; and at all times the homely or eccentric testator who
allows many a secret comedy or tragedy to appear, many a prejudice
or foible, many a sentiment of resignation or revolt. Some give the
impression of peevishness and irresolution, of spite or hate; some of
sentimental or petty desires; some of serene care for the future, of
dignity and calm.
Little, indeed, in all literature is more arresting than the revelation
of personality, the unveiling of intimacies that are seldom seen: in
wills these intimacies occur, the veil is withdrawn, in a manner that
elsewhere can rarely be observed. Whether they be light or serious,
amusing or tragic, the occurrence of such vivid traits in a will gives
them a character peculiarly humorous or correspondingly sad. The
idiosyncrasy is magnified, the bias more distorted, when placed in such
a setting.
On the other hand, the interest of a will may arise not merely or so
much from its provisions in themselves, as from our knowledge of the
inner history of the testator’s life and death. Bishop Corbet, that
witty and jovial soul, was one of those fathers who, for all their
love and longing, for all their piety, are disgraced by their sons. In
his will, dated July 7, 1635, and proved on the 5th of the following
September, he wrote: “I commit and commend the nurture education and
maintenance of my son and daughter into the faithful and loving care of
my mother-in-law, declaring my intent by this my last will, as I have
often in my health expressed the same, that my desire is that my said
son be brought up in good learning, and that as soon as he shall be fit
be placed in Oxford or Cambridge, where I require him upon my blessing
to apply himself to his books studiously and industriously.”
He had in “health expressed the same” by verse: but the son Vincent,
in spite of prayer and admonition, was a ne’er-do-well, and after the
Bishop’s death a beggar in London. These lines were addressed to him
upon his third birthday by his fond but ill-requited father:—
“I wish thee, Vin., before all wealth,
Both bodily and ghostly health:
Nor too much wealth, nor wit, come to thee,
So much of either may undo thee.
I wish thee learning, not for show,
Enough for to instruct, and know;
Not such as gentlemen require,
To prate at table, or at fire.
I wish thee all thy mother’s graces,
Thy father’s fortune, and his places.
I wish thee friends, and one at court,
Not to build on but support;
To keep thee, not in doing many
Oppressions, but from suffering any.
I wish thee peace in all thy ways,
Nor lazy nor contentious days;
And when thy soul and body part,
As innocent as now thou art.”
Or take the case of the Gills, father and son. Alexander Gill, senior,
was High Master of St. Paul’s School from 1608 to 1635, and is famous
as having numbered Milton among his pupils. A degree of fame is also
his for the unsparing use of the rod, which he wielded even upon his
son, the under master:
“‘O good Sir,’ then cry’d he,
‘In private let it be,
And do not sauce me openly.’”
In his will we see that as he had ruled in his lifetime, so he would
have his wife rule after him. “And although it may seem needless to
charge my sons so professed how they should honour their mother, yet
I hold it fit in and by this my last will to leave this precept unto
them as my last remembrance, charging them as much as I can that,
as they hope for a blessing of God to be with them, to give her that
honour which is due as the law of God and nature bindeth them, and in
every thing to harken to her counsel and precept and to obey her and be
ruled by her.”
Nor is it surprising to find that another son, Nathaniel, “hath refused
my correction,” and that he has an “unthankful and injurious brother.”
“To my unthankful and injurious brother Simon Gill I freely forgive
all debts which he oweth me, with all demands for other charges of
food apparel losses and supplies in his want by which I have been much
damnified by him, which in a most charitable accompt would come to
above fifty pounds; I forgive, I say, all most freely except one bill
of eight pounds, which debt I give to my executrix, with hope she will
not be troublesome to him by suit thereof except he become troublesome
unto her or her children as his manner hath been towards me and others.”
There are other interesting passages, but as a final touch to the
will of this stormy nature it may be noticed that he gives “the dust
of this wicked carcase to be buried in the dust.” Altogether his will
confirms the opinion of Aubrey in his “Brief Lives,” that “Dr. Gill,
the father, was a very ingeniose person, as may appear by his writings.
Notwithstanding he had moodes and humours.”
Sometimes the circumstances suggest romance. “On the morning of the
action between the Portland packet and the Temeraire French privateer,
off Guadaloupe, on the 14th of October, 1796,” says Kirby’s “Wonderful
Museum” (1803), “Mr. Cunningham, a passenger, who, in a previous
engagement sustained by the Portland packet with another privateer, had
evinced great courage, observed to the captain that he felt a strong
impression that his dissolution was at hand; and on the enemy bearing
in sight, he went below and made his will, declaring his hour was come;
returning to his station on deck, in a few minutes a bullet verified
his prediction.”
So it has been again and again, from the case of Mary Stuart, writing
her will in her own hand during the last hours before her execution,
or of Archbishop Laud drawing up his will in the Tower, to the case of
Señor Ferrer, dictating his testament in the prison chapel at Barcelona.
II
Strange histories, it will be seen, lie behind wills, dull and similar
as at first sight the majority appears. The history may not always be
explicit, but the suggestion conveyed by some gift or revocation, some
phrase or fact, may often be completed by the reader’s imagination. So
Dorothy Skipwith, of Catesby, in Lincolnshire (will dated 1677), “did
revoke and declare void the legacy of twenty guineas mentioned to be
given to Mr. Shomoon, a Frenchman living in Whitehall, which she said
she so revoked in regard he refused to come to her in the time of her
sickness.”
At times we know something of that which lies beneath the surface of
the will. The Duchesse d’Angoulême (died October 19, 1851) forgives,
“following the example of her parents,” all who have injured her,
expressing her love for France and her gratitude to the Emperor of
Austria. And towards the end she states: “I wish all the sheets,
papers or books written by my hand, which are in my strong-box or my
tables, to be burnt by the executors of my will.” These, we are told,
were prayers, meditations, notes which might have caused hurt to the
feelings of others, lists of charities and books of account. The will
is signed in the name of “Marie Thérèse de France, Comtesse de Maines,”
the title which she took in her days of exile.
Anne Davis, spinster, whose will is dated November 14, 1803, reveals,
or half-reveals, some family trouble. She directs that “in case of my
demise my poor decayed body to be decently interred in the burying
ground of Marybone upon the grave where my late dear aunt and friend
lays; her name is on a stone, and I desire mine to be put on the
stone.... I desire to have a patent coffin lined on the outside with
the best black cloth, nails, etc., etc., and every thing that is proper
on this occasion, the best hearse and one coach with the black velvet
feathers and porters. I desire Mr. William Joachim, Mrs. Joachim, Miss
Joachim and Mrs. Toby ... to see my poor decayed body decently buried
upon my dear aunt’s grave,” and “I desire Mr. William Joachim, my
executor, will advertise for my brother Mr. William Davis. The last
time I ever saw him was the 8th of May, 1794, for he desired to see my
dear aunt when she lay dead. He said he was going down to Portsmouth
in the agency line. May God forgive him for all his unkindness to me;
I freely forgive him, and please God that he may make a proper use of
what I have left him.”
Edward Roberts, bachelor, of the parish of St. Clement’s Danes (but
when he made his will in July, 1664, on board the _Great Eagle_), was
open and emotional: “Whensoever it shall please God to call me out of
the world, whether I die by sea or by land, I do give will and bequeath
all that ever I have or shall leave behind me at my death ... unto
Elizabeth Jones whom I love with all my heart and above all women in
the world. And if I had a thousand pounds or neversomuch she should
have every groat of it.”
It needs no subtlety of imagination to diagnose his case; but one would
like to unravel the story of romantic tenderness that seems to lurk
behind the simple will of a Richard Mathews, servant to Hugh Hamersley,
of Spring Gardens, St. Martins-in-the-Fields. He died (was it of love?)
on or before the 10th of October, 1779. His will was dated October
5th, and after some legacies, including one to Mrs. Collis, his “late
worthy fellow-servant,” he continues: “It is my further desire that 5s.
apiece may be given to the men as carries me to church, and it is my
further desire to be buried in a decent manner and my body laid by a
young woman who died at the Rev. Mr. Ellet’s some time ago.”
That the lover is careful to choose suitably his last resting-place
we know from the will of Chrysostom in “Don Quixote.” “‘This morning
that famous student-shepherd called Chrysostom died, and it is rumoured
that he died of love for that devil of a village girl, the daughter
of Guillermo the Rich, she that wanders about the wolds here in the
dress of a shepherdess.’ ‘You mean Marcela?’ said one. ‘Her I mean,’
answered the goatherd; ‘and the best of it is, he has directed in his
will that he is to be buried in the fields like a Moor, and at the foot
of the rock where the Cork-tree spring is, because, as the story goes
(and they say he himself said so) that was the place where he first
saw her.’” With similar sentiment Sir Miles St. John, in Lord Lytton’s
“Lucretia,” by his will requested that a small miniature in his
writing-desk should be placed in his coffin. “That last injunction was
more than a sentiment: it bespoke the moral conviction of the happiness
the original might have conferred on his life.”
In fiction we may realise what terrible deeds or poignant memories are
revived and referred to by the clauses of a will. Thus in Mrs. Henry
Wood’s “George Canterbury’s Will” we know, when Mrs. Dawke’s will is
read, that her husband is the murderer of her child: “To my present
husband ... five-and-twenty pounds, wherewith to purchase a mourning
ring, which he will wear in remembrance of my dear child, Thomas
Canterbury.”
In real wills such knowledge is often hidden from us. Yet innumerable
touches, tender or strange, harsh or sweet, break through their
monotony; ways of life and attitudes of thought, records of deeds or
feelings long ago, are brought vividly before us. Do not the romance
and spirit of England live again in such a document as this? “Right
Worshipful, I safely arrived in the Downs from the Straits the 22nd day
of March last and got to London on Easter Eve, where I presented myself
to the Dean of Westminster and other friends. But on Easter Monday
I was engaged by Sir William Penn to go along with him to the Great
Fleet under the command of his Royal Highness the Duke of York, the
which I readily embraced as thinking it my duty to appear wheresoever
I may in probability do the Church, my Prince, and my Country, the
best service possible. I am at present constituted chaplain on board
the _Unicorn_ where the Lord Peterborough is to sail. Our fleet I can
assure you is in a gallant posture, lying not far from Harwich, at all
points ready for action. I freely refer myself to the goodness of my
God, who hath preserved me hitherto in many dangers (viz.) of battle
shipwrecks fire and storms, etc. And if I shall be taken out of the
world my desires are as heretofore (viz.) that such moneys of mine as
are in your Worship’s hands, or aught else that may be any ways due
to me from Christ Church, be about Michaelmas next, 1665, paid unto
Alexander Vincent, the eldest son of my brother Ambrose Vincent, or if
he shall not then be living unto my eldest surviving nephew whether by
brother or sister. I wish all prosperity and happiness to yourself, Dr.
Allestry and my friends in Christ Church, and remain your much obliged
and true friend and servant John Vincent. (From aboard the _Unicorn_
riding with the Fleet not far from Harwich April 12, 1665.)”
But the seafaring spirit has not always run so high, as the will of a
Richard French reveals. “At the Cowes in the Isle of Wight the 18th
of July, 1636. Whereas by reason of certain disabilities which I
have found in myself more than ordinary this voyage, every man being
almost disencouraged in respect of the smallness of the vessel and
desperateness of the journey, because that my mate Robert Anderson hath
by his no small industry and to the maintaining of my credit undertaken
this voyage with me and still carefully pursued, I do here in this
paper confirm and refer over unto him by deed of gift, conditionally he
goes this journey and I miscarry, all the goods belonging to me in the
pinnace.” Evidently the testator did miscarry, for the document was
proved on the 19th of August, a month and a day after its execution.
III
Thomas Eden, whose will is dated at Wimbledon, August 14, 1803, only
whets the appetite: “I, Thomas Eden, of sound mind and understanding,
though gradually failing in personal strength from advance in years
and what I have gone through in my life, do make this my last will and
testament.” But many curious items of biography emerge from wills.
Sometimes they are accidental or incidental; at other times the
testator makes much of them. Philip, fifth Earl of Pembroke, bequeathed
“to Thomas May, whose nose I did break at a mascarade, five shillings.”
Recently a legacy was left to one whom the testator had nearly burned
to death, another to one whom a testator had saved from drowning. “I
have been very unfortunate,” wrote a lady lately deceased. “I thought
to have a companion for the rest of my days by remarrying, but am once
more stranded and alone.”
Sir John Gayer, an illustrious seventeenth-century citizen of London,
is still remembered in an annual sermon at St. Katharine Cree,
Leadenhall Street, preached by direction of his will in commemoration
of his escape from a lion on the coast of Africa. Ezekiel Nash (will
dated March 27, 1800) left a charitable legacy for his preservation
in an engagement with a French frigate on March the 8th, 1762. A late
manager to a shipping company directed that on his tomb should be
inscribed the words:
“Let on his soul kind judgment fall,
Who did his best for one and all,”
and the following summary of his achievements: “He helped to change
paddle tugs to screw, to initiate high pressure and twin screws for
ocean-going steamers, to introduce the Steam line Conference with
the rebate system, and to start the Shipping Federation, the London
Shipping Exchange, and the British Empire League.”
Richard Forster, in his will dated November 15, 1728, opens with some
remarks on the Church and his position therein. “In the name of God
Amen. I Richard Forster, an unworthy minister of Jesus Christ, advanced
into the order of Christian priesthood according to the usage of the
Church of England, the soundest and best constituted part of the
Catholic Church, (a great number of whose parochial clergy have been
unhappily deprived of a great part of their revenues by the injurious
appropriation of tythes glebes and parsonage houses under the iniquity
of Popery,) and intending to spend the remainder of my days in the
communion and service of this Church, having by the providence of God
and the kindness of my friends been first promoted to the Rectory of
Beckly, in Sussex, and after to that of Crundale, in Kent, and lastly
to the Vicarage of Eastchurch, in Sheppey, (the defects of my duty
in all which parishes I pray God of His infinite mercy to pardon,)
and being advanced into the seventy-eighth year of my age by the
distinguishing favour of God with a sound mind and memory, though with
a weak body, I do make and ordain this my last will and testament.”
John Wakring’s will, proved June 14, 1665, was written at Portsmouth
in the form of a letter from on board the _Resolution_, November 23,
1664: “Mistress Elizabeth, my kind love and best respects presented
unto you, hoping these few lines will find you in good health as I
was at the present writing hereof. I have presumed, hoping it will be
acceptable, to acquaint you of the receival of your letter wherein I
received much joy to hear of your welfare. I should think myself the
happiest man alive if I could attain so much time as for to see you
before my departure, but since God has decreed it otherwise by reason
of much business imposed upon me, nevertheless I would have you accept
of all that is mine as yours if God shall deal with me otherwise than
I do expect. In the meantime I would entreat you for to have a great
care of what you have in your custody, because it may stand you in good
stead hereafter, which is the letter of attorney which I left you in
for the receival of all that is due unto me and my servant from the
time I came out as clerk and everything else. Furthermore, I give you
to understand that I am at the time Sir William Barkley’s cook and am
in very much respect on all sides, and hope, for all these wars, I
shall see you in good estate if God permit. So with my humble duty to
your mother, and my kind love to your brother and sister and to all the
rest of my friends in general, I rest yours, if God bless and permit me
life, John Wakring.”
It is in these informal wills, naturally, that such delightful glimpses
are more frequently obtained, and perhaps one other example may be
tolerated. It is late in the next century, very different in tone
from the seventeenth-century heroes, John Vincent or John Wakring.
Jane Bowdler was an invalid, a spinster of Bath. The language of her
will, proved March 4, 1786, is characteristic of the century. “My
dear and ever honoured father, from the great indulgence you have
always expressed for me I am led to believe that it will still be a
satisfaction to you to comply with some little requests of mine, and
therefore I will mention a few things which I would beg you to do for
me after my death. And first I beg to repeat the sincerest assurances
of my duty love and gratitude to you and my mother, and I pray to God
to bless you and reward you for all your kindness to me. I wish these
sentiments had been better expressed in my lifetime, but I fear my ill
health and loss of speech have sometimes made me a burden to my friends
as well as in some degree to myself. These considerations will,
however, I trust contribute to reconcile them to my death, since the
enjoyment of society has long been in a great measure taken away. Let
us rejoice in an humble but comfortable hope that we shall meet again
in a far happier state to be separated no more. May God of His infinite
mercy grant it.”
IV
Above all, the thought that a will is nothing if not a preparation for
death gives to its study the ultimate significance. For what can be
more momentous than decisions then; what more humorous, in the older
and deeper sense, than foibles and follies at such an hour? What can be
more arresting than the persistence which prompts a man at the approach
of death to seal his life’s work, evil or beneficent, with the sanction
of his will? “Even on the verge of the grave he sought to slake his
ambition by unlawful means; and he succeeded,” says Dr. August Fournier
of Napoleon I. Charles V., in a codicil executed a few days before his
death, solemnly exhorts his son to extirpate the heresy of Luther.
Señor Ferrer dictates his will in the prison chapel at Barcelona,
emphasising the salient points of his belief. There is no retractation
or regret.
John Boyce, “he being desperately wounded in one of his legs the 25th
day of July, 1666, in the engagement with the Hollanders” sets his hand
and seal to his testament “first in the presence of my God above, and
in the presence of us John King, Robert Goulding.” There is a fine
simplicity and solemnity in that. The Noble Robert Dunant, whose will
is dated at Geneva, August 12, 1768, writes simply and solemnly too.
“I the underwritten Counsellor of State, having first humbled myself
before God and implored the assistance of His good Spirit to conduct me
wisely as well in the present as all the other acts of my life, have
made and do make my will in the following manner.”
But casual and worldly wills are common enough. A few words on a
picture-postcard, “All for mother” on an old envelope, have been
thought enough, or have proved enough for a valid will. Mrs. Lirriper’s
legacy, readers of Dickens will remember, was written in pencil on
the back of the ace of hearts. “To the authorities. When I am dead
pray send what is left, as a last legacy, to Mrs. Lirriper, eighty-one
Norfolk Street, Strand, London.”
With others the preparation for death is a pious literary task.
Recently a little volume found its way into the writer’s hands from
the Maison du Sacré Cœur de Beauvais, a “Testament Spirituel,” which,
though not executed for a court of law, must have found favour in
the courts of heaven. In wills, indeed, we see the romance of souls.
Catholic, Anglican, and Protestant dedications of the soul to God,
whether in the fifteenth or the sixteenth century, are often very
beautiful and touching. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
the custom and tradition have departed. Only occasionally a Catholic
or a fervent Evangelical recalls forgotten days. Some examples of
eighteenth-century piety will be given later, but these essays would
not be complete without other illustrations.
As an example from Catholic England the following is typical: “In the
name of God, Amen. I Dame Anne Haydon, widow, being in my whole mind
and of good memory the XVIIth day of December in the year of our Lord
God 1509, and in the first year of King Henry the VIIIth, make this my
testament and last will in manner and form following, that is to say,
First, gracious Jesu, I as a sinful creature by reason of my demerits
not worthy to be accepted into the holy company of heaven to continue
in that holy place, Lord, without Thy great and large mercy and grace,
(the which through Thy Passion to every Christian man meekly and lowly
asking graciously grantest): Wherefore I now being in my full and whole
mind and in perfect love and charity, and in steadfast faith, ask and
cry Thee, Jesu, our Lady Saint Mary Thy blessed Mother, all the holy
company of heaven, and all the world, mercy, trusting verily that
through Thy Passion and with the succour and relief of that gracious
Lady Thy Mother and Maid to sinners to her calling for help of her
great pity greatly and very comfortable: Wherefore, blessed Jesu, I
commit my soul to Thee and to Thy blessed Mother our Lady Saint Mary
and to all saints of heaven through the mean and help of St. John
Baptist, St. Anne, St. Mary Magdalen and St. Christopher mine avouers.
And my sinful body to be buried in the Chapel of St. Luke in the
Cathedral Church of the Holy Trinity of Norwich, if I die in Norwich or
in Norfolk.”
Such is a common form, diversified by individual and expressive
variations, of wills in those days. The Reformation changed the form
but not the spirit of these avowals. “I render back,” wrote Sarah Ward
in 1662, “into the hands of my God and Creator the soul I received from
Him, humbly desiring His fatherly goodness for the infinite merit of
His Son Jesus Christ and His all-sufficient Passion, (on which I wholly
rely, disclaiming any confidence in saints or angels,) that He would
make it partaker of eternal life and a citizen of His heavenly Kingdom.
My body I bequeath to the earth whence it was taken, firmly believing
the resurrection of the dead, and that I shall rise again in the last
day, and see God in my flesh with the self-same eyes I now use and no
other. The manner of interring it I leave wholly to my executors ...
being no farther solicitous for so contemptible a remnant than as it is
yet the hospital of a reasonable soul.”
But with the fervent eloquence of Thomas Peniston, of St. Margaret’s,
near the City of Rochester, Esquire (proved the 5th of September,
1601), these considerations must be concluded. “In the Name of the
most holy and incomprehensible Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, in
Person three, in power one, almighty and everlasting God, Creator of
Heaven and Earth and all therein contained, to whose glorious Deity
I poor wretch His creature do from the bottom of my heart and soul
render most humble and most hearty thanks for all His innumerable
benefits bestowed on me, as my creation of nought, my redemption by
that divine mystery of the Incarnation and generous Passion of my sweet
Saviour Jesus Christ, when I was through the offence of my forefather
Adam become worse than nought, my continual preservation in the life
present, mine election to Salvation before the foundations of the
world were laid, my assured hope of glorification in time to come
through His infinite mercy by the mediation of Jesus Christ, and for
all whatsoever hath befallen me of good since my first entrance into
this vale of misery, acknowledging them all to have proceeded merely
of His unspeakable bounty and goodness without any spark of merit or
desert in myself, and so much the more am I bound to Him for the same,
most humbly beseeching His most glorious Majesty to accept in good part
this my sincere sacrifice of thanksgiving as the only oblation which
my poor sin-distressed soul in all humbleness of heart and ferventest
spiritual zeal can offer unto Him for all those His manifold graces
towards me, and that it will please Him for His mercy’s sake in the
blood of that immaculate Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, to vouchsafe to
continue His gracious goodness towards me both now and at all times
hereafter, and at the present by the assistance of His Holy Spirit so
to direct me in the setting down of this my last will and testament
as the same may best sort to His glory, my comfort, and the good of
those whom it may concern.... And first as the most principal part I
do with a free and cheerful heart bequeath my soul unto almighty God
the Creator and Redeemer thereof, most humbly beseeching Him for His
mercies’ sake through Jesus Christ the only begotten and well-beloved
Son of God the Father, in whom He is well pleased, to receive the same
into His most holy and gracious protection, cleansing and purging
the sinful deformities thereof with the precious blood of that my
only sweet Saviour, and to bury all my transgressions and offences of
what nature or kind soever in the bottom of the sea, that they never
rise up in judgment against me, but that I (though of myself the most
miserable sinner alive), through His infinite and unspeakable mercy by
His loving imputation of the perfect righteousness and true obedience
of that my most sweet Saviour Jesus Christ, who being perfect God
became man, and after full performance of God’s most holy laws and
commandments endured the most horrible tortures of death thereby to
save my poor soul from the intolerable and endless torments of hell
fire, which of itself (ah woe is me therefore) it hath deserved, and
to make it inheritable to the unspeakable joys in Heaven; of which His
most gracious favour being throughly assured by His holy Spirit in
my soul which continually warranteth me to sing all honour, glory and
praise unto my dear Father in Heaven, who in His mercy, (which by many
thousand degrees exceedeth my manifold transgressions,) hath created
and adopted me to be an heir of His heavenly and everlasting kingdom,
I most assuredly hope and undoubtedly expect that whenso it shall
please His incomprehensible Deity the fullness of time to be expired,
this poor soul of mine being through His all-working power knit again
to this my flesh which then shall be made incorruptible and immortal,
I shall without end in Heaven enjoy the sight of my most glorious and
everlasting God my Creator, Redeemer and Comforter, and there for ever
with the holy saints, angels and archangels, laud honour praise and
worship His most holy Name to my infinite unspeakable and sempiternal
comfort. And as concerning my body which I hope I shall be always at
the pleasure of my good God most ready to yield up, I will that after
my death the same shall be buried in decent sort by the direction of my
executors in the Cathedral Church of Rochester according to my degree
and calling.”
V
It will readily be realised how wills from time to time illustrate the
bare facts of history, with what vividness they might invest them if
more frequently cited. Thus Margaret, Lady Hungerford, in 1476 enjoins
her heirs not to disturb any of the alienations of her property, which
she had been obliged to make owing to “seasons of trouble time late
passed,” viz., the Wars of the Roses. Richard Lumley, Knight, Lord
Viscount Lumley, writes on the 13th of April, in the thirteenth year of
Charles II.: “And could I have done more for my family than I have done
I would; and had done much more for them had not I had so great losses
by the late calamitous times.”
Richard Burnand, of Knaresborough (1591), gives to his cousin “Dynnys
Baynebrigge and his wife two silver goblets, worth in value XLs a
piece, with my arms and name upon them, and they to have the use of
them during their lives; and after their deceases I give the same
goblets unto Anne Faux and Elizabeth Faux.” To Guy Faux he gives “two
angels, to make him a ring.” This Guy is the celebrated and almost
mythical figure in whose honour bonfires still flare on November 5th.
Anne and Elizabeth were his sisters, and Mrs. Baynebrigge, widow of
Edward Fawkes, their mother. Moreover, by the wills of Robert Wilcox in
1627, and of Luke Jackson in 1630, sermons were directed to be preached
yearly on November 5th in honour of the discovery of the plot.
In days to come, perhaps, peculiar interest will attach to the will
of Mlle. Meunier, the Frenchwoman who sympathised with the views of
Ferrer and left him a considerable legacy some ten years before his
execution. But who can estimate the value of Raisley Calvert’s legacy
to Wordsworth, whereby the poet was relieved of the deadening care of
money-making?
“A youth—(he bore
The name of Calvert—it shall live, if words
Of mine can give it life,) in firm belief
That by endowments not from me withheld
Good might me furthered—in his last decay
By a bequest sufficient for my needs
Enabled me to pause for choice, and walk
At large and unrestrained, nor damped too soon
By mortal cares. Himself no Poet, yet
Far less a common follower of the world,
He deemed that my pursuits and labours lay
Apart from all that leads to wealth, or even
A necessary maintenance insures,
Without some hazard to the finer sense;
He cleared a passage for me, and the stream
Flowed in the bent of Nature.”
Changes and controversies in the Church find an echo in wills. Dr.
Sanderson, Bishop of Lincoln, whose will was made about three weeks
before his death (January 29, 1662-3) professes his faith at a
significant date: “And here I do profess that as I have lived so I
desire and—by the grace of God—resolve, to die in the communion of the
Catholic Church of Christ, and a true son of the Church of England:
which, as it stands by law established, to be both in doctrine and
worship agreeable to the word of God, and in the most material points
of both conformable to the faith and practice of the godly Churches of
Christ in the primitive and purer times, I do firmly believe: led so
to do, not so much from the force of custom and education—to which the
greatest part of mankind owe their particular different persuasions
in point of Religion,—as upon the clear evidence of truth and reason,
after a serious and impartial examination of the grounds, as well of
Popery as Puritanism, according to that measure of understanding,
and those opportunities which God hath afforded me: and herein I am
abundantly satisfied that the schism which the Papists on the one
hand, and the superstitions which the Puritans on the other, lay to
our charge, are very justly chargeable upon themselves respectively.
Wherefore I humbly beseech Almighty God, the Father of mercies, to
preserve the Church by His power and providence, in peace, truth, and
godliness, evermore to the world’s end: which doubtless He will do,
if the wickedness and security of a sinful people—and particularly
the sins that are so rife, and seem daily to increase among us, of
unthankfulness, riot and sacrilege—do not tempt His patience to the
contrary. And I also further humbly beseech Him, that it would please
Him to give unto our gracious Sovereign, the reverend Bishops, and the
Parliament, timely to consider the great danger that visibly threatens
this Church in point of religion by the late great increase of Popery,
and in point of revenue by sacrilegious inclosures; and to provide such
wholesome and effectual remedies, as may prevent the same before it be
too late.”
Similarly, Richard Ward, whose will is dated February 6, 1664-5,
bequeaths his “body to the earth whence it was taken, to be decently
and Christianly buried according to the order of the Church of England
... wishing and praying from my very soul that this sinful and
unthankful kingdom may never forget or forfeit that most miraculous
mercy of God in restoring and establishing it.” Such contemporary
comments are fascinating; so, too, the spirit of the same testator who
dedicates his “young tender and only son George Ward” to the service
of the Church, “if God shall so dispose his heart, which I trust He
will because I am not without hopes that God Almighty did accept of my
solemn dedication of him before he was formed in the womb. And the good
God be his guide and portion.” It is not surprising to find this gentle
spirit “languishing under the fatherly visitation of my most gracious
God, to whose good pleasure I with all cheerfulness submit,” and
speaking of his “dear sweet wife” and “dear and tenderly loving wife.”
The Restoration is a landmark in history. But there are passages in
wills which recall the clash of controversialists forgotten now, yet
provocative of fierce animosities in their time. Edward Evanson, who
became Rector of Tewkesbury in 1769, was a modernist and innovator,
a Richard Meynell of his day. In reading the services he would adapt
words or phrases at pleasure, and in the lessons point out errors of
translation. But a crisis was provoked by a sermon on the Resurrection
preached at Easter, 1771. He was prosecuted in the Consistory Court
of Gloucester, for “depraving the public worship of God contained
in the liturgy of the Church of England, asserting the same to be
superstitious and unchristian, preaching, writing, and conversing
against the creeds and the divinity of our Saviour, and assuming to
himself the power of making arbitrary alterations in his performance
of the public worship.” Finally the charge fell through, on technical
grounds, in 1777, but Mr. N. Havard, town clerk of Tewkesbury,
published a narrative of the case. After a life of controversy Evanson
died on September 25, 1805.
We can trace out bequests both for and against this troubler of the
peace. Penelope Taylor, of Worcester, a widow with views beyond the
circle of her home, gave by a codicil dated July 5, 1776, to Mr. Havard
£200 to testify her approbation of his conduct “in the prosecution
against Mr. Evanson, Vicar of Tewkesbury, and toward the expense of
that laudable suit in the defence of Christianity.”
But Dr. Messenger Monsey, with no measured language, in his will
dated twelve years later, upholds the other side. The controversy was
not forgotten. Dr. Monsey was a contemporary of Dr. Johnson, one who
“talked bawdy” in the latter’s less than elegant phrase. His will, in
several respects noteworthy, must appear again. He had given, he says,
by a previous will an annuity of £50 to Mr. Evanson; but since he had
declined it, the testator substituted a nominal gift of £10 per annum,
to manifest his great regard “for my friend Mr. Edward Evanson, and
the opinions I have of his abilities and integrity in standing forth
so ably as he has done in support of reason and true religion against
the nonsense jargon and impiety so avowedly professed by a set of A.
B————ps, D————ns, P————ts, and D————cons, who stood forth in defence of
creeds articles and subscriptions without suffering or promoting any
reformation for establishing the purity and simplicity of reasonable
Christianity.”
Last of all died Evanson. His will is disappointing. It opens thus:
“I Edward Evanson think it my duty under present circumstances to
dispose of that portion of worldly property with which it hath pleased
the divine providence of God to bless me.” Otherwise there is no
reference to religion, none to his stormy life, save this incidental
remark: “Conscientious objections to the Liturgy of the Established
Church having prevented my standing godfather for my brother-in-law
Mr. William Alchorne’s son, which I should otherwise have done, in
lieu of the customary baptismal gifts I now give and bequeath to Mr.
Wm. Alchorne aforesaid the sum of £50 in trust and for the sole use of
his son Evanson Alchorne.” His wife Dorothy was residuary legatee, and
the will, witnessed by three servants, was dated April 8, 1805, and
proved on October 16th. He was a fighter; but not one of those who make
militant wills, proclaiming, as it were with the last breath, their
prepossessions and beliefs.
VI
“When London’s plague, that day by day enrolled
His thousands dead, nor deigned his rage to abate
Till grass was green in silent Bishopsgate,
Had come and passed like thunder—still, ’tis told,
The monster, driven to earth, in hovels old
And haunts obscure, though dormant, lingered late,
Till the dread Fire, one roaring wave of fate,
Rose, and swept clean his last retreat and hold.”
WILLIAM WATSON.
It was to be expected that the plagues would leave their mark on these
records, and very tragic such traces are. Many were driven to make
their wills while still in health, but others delayed till the sickness
had seized them. Of the latter more will be quoted hereafter; a few of
the former may here illustrate the plague of 1665. It is strange that
Defoe did not embellish his narrative with documents so vivid.
Death came swiftly, nor was it possible always to set the will down
in writing. “Memorandum that on or about the nineteenth day of July
in the year of our Lord God 1665 Edward Thompson, late of the parish
of St. Paul’s in Covent Garden in the County of Middlesex, shoemaker,
being then of good health of body and of good or perfect memory, but
his house being then shut up and visited with the plague, and one of
his children shortly before dying in the house of the same disease, he
declared his last will and testament nuncupative, or by word of mouth,
in these or the like words following, that is to say: It is my last
will and desire that, if it please God to take me out of this world
by this present visitation, that then my loving friend and cousin,
Mr. Andrew Caldwall, shall take care of my son Alexander Thompson,
(being then his only surviving child) and shall bring him up and put
him forth an apprentice, and when my said son shall come to full age
to give him a just account of my estate and pay unto him what shall be
then remaining thereof in his hands. But if it shall please God that
my said son Alexander shall die also, then after the death of my said
son I give to my two brothers in Scotland and to their children 1/-
apiece. And all the rest of my goods, chattels and estate whatsoever I
give and bequeath unto the said Andrew Caldwall, in regard I have been
more beholding unto him than to my brothers or to any friend in the
world.” Evidently he was struck down swiftly, for on the 5th of August
following this will was proved.
We see the fear of death hanging over the town, and how hastily wills
were prepared. “My mother desired me on her death bed to be a brother
to my sister Mary Grover, and if she lived to give her in money ten
pounds, (and) a gold ring which was my mother’s.... If it should please
God to take me away, and my sister alive, I desire she should have all
that is her’s.... John Hunt will be one to see that it be not baffled
away but carefully looked to for the good of my poor sister.... And my
desire is that she be defrauded of none, but that care be taken for the
child’s bringing up. As for my burial accordingly to the discretion of
my overseers: if healthy times decently, if other times according to
their appointment. This I writ myself for fear I should be deprived by
sudden death.... The trunk at Mr. Hall’s and chest and box are top full
of the best of linen and other things, and my trunk is top full at the
Tavern.... If I die I pray let this be engrossed and put for my will in
court. Written 1st September, 1665.” (John Grover, proved May 13, 1666.)
Henry Dickens, of St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields, cordwainer, makes his
will “being at this present sick and weak in body, but of sound and
perfect mind and memory, for which I give all possible praise and
thanks to Almighty God, and not knowing what may befall me in these sad
times of God’s heavy visitation with the plague, (dated September 6,
1665, proved May 4, 1666);” Ralph Tymberlake, tallow chandler, “calling
to mind the great uncertainty of this life, especially at this time
when the arrows of God’s wrath are amongst us,” (dated September 9,
1665, proved September 20th); and John Garland thus: “The Lord’s hand
being evidently gone out against this city, and not knowing how soon
the stroke of death may be my portion, in order thereunto I make this
my last will and testament. And in the first place I commit my soul
into the arms of my Saviour the Lord Jesus in hope of His appearing
at the resurrection of the dead, that when He appears I also may
appear with Him in glory; and my body to be buried in a decent place
and without funeral pomp, and so deep in the earth as not unnaturally
to take up other men’s bones or too easily to scratch up my own by
others.” (Dated August 15, 1665, proved January 5th following.) What
bitter irony that at such a time he wishes to be buried “without
funeral pomp”!
But peculiarly pathetic is the will of Henry Mabank. It is a letter to
his mother, in the country, perhaps, and dreading every hour to hear
that her son was stricken. It was proved on May 4, 1666. “Dear Mother,
my duty to you remembered, and my love to my brothers and sisters and
to Mr. Rudd and Mistress Rudd and Billy and to Henry Chandler, hoping
you are all in good health as I am at this present writing, thanks be
to God. Dear Mother, my desire and will is, that if you never see me
more that my brother George and sister Betty and sister Ann shall have
£100 which is upon bond equally divided between them.... Dear Mother,
if it please God that I live till the 7th of August there will be £10
due to me from my master and £3 due the 20th of August upon bond. This
£13 I will leave to your disposing. I am not afraid of the sickness,
yet it is very near our house. I pray excuse me from writing every
week; you shall hear of my welfare in Mrs. Rudd’s letters. So in haste
I rest, Your dutiful son till death, Henry Mabank. July the 20th,
1665.”
Finally, the horrors of the plague and its attendant heroisms are
recalled by the will of Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey, proved April 14, 1679.
His will is otherwise remarkable, consistent with his fine independent
character, and this opportunity may be taken for quoting it in part.
How little his wishes were observed students of his life will know,
and they will know also how peculiar were the circumstances of his
death, which are briefly related at the close of the following essay.
“I desire my executors ... to cause my body to be privately buried in
the meanest place of burial belonging to that parish or place wherein
I shall die but not in the Church, this to be performed without pomp
or pageantry, not to be accompanied with numerous attendants either
of friends or relations the which as I affected not in my lifetime I
would not have imposed on me being dead: to that end, and to avoid
being troublesome to the world and especially to the streets when dead,
I desire to be buried very early in the morning or very late at night
with as much privateness as may be, without any solemn invitation
of my acquaintances or kindred as also without any funeral sermon
or other harangue, which I do hereby forbid, any monument or other
memorial of stone or brass to be made for me, hoping that my failings
will be buried with me in the grave without any partial remembrance
of evil or good actions, if any such have been, which are so called
at the relator’s pleasure. As for the Charity which I have for some
years bestowed on the poor of the parish of St. Martin’s in the Fields
aforesaid, viz. 10/-in bread on every Lord’s Day or on some day at the
beginning of each week, my will is that my executors ... do jointly and
severally take care and continue to do the same by themselves for the
space of ten years from and after the time of my decease.... And I do
further will that the Charity by me given of 2/-per week in bread to
the poor of the parish of Selling being the place of my birth[1] ...
be weekly continued to be given ... in the same manner during the same
time and on the like terms as are already mentioned in the behalf of
the poor of the parish of St. Martin’s in the Fields aforesaid, and
be continued after the determination of twenty-one years on the same
terms therein expressed at the discretion of my executors their heirs
or executors and no otherwise. Item: I give unto my brother Mr. Peter
Godfrey, if he shall be living at the time of my death and not else,
one hundred pounds instead of my great silver flagon once intended him
whereon are engraven His Majesty’s Royal Arms with my own adjoined, and
was so given unto me by order of the King and Council in memory of the
service which God enabled me to perform towards the visited poor in
that dreadful year of plague 1665, the which I am always to remember
with humility and true thankfulness.... And I do particularly give unto
my brother Mr. Michael Godfrey my great flagon aforementioned of the
King’s gift.”
After the plague, the fire. That naturally does not loom large in
wills, but references may be found. Thus Edmund Calamy, “minister of
the gospel,” whose will was dated October 4, 1666, and proved November
14th, gave to his “dear and loving wife,” Anne Calamy, “all the ground
whereon my house stood which was lately burned down, called or known
by the name and sign of the Rose, and was situate and being in St.
Nicholas Lane, London, and all the timber and all the materials which
did belong to the same that yet remain unburned, (if any be).” “And as
for the manner of my burial, my desire is to be buried in the ruins of
Aldermanbury Church; and in regard of my many children my will is that,
besides mourning unto my relations, nothing be given at my funeral, not
doubting that my friends and acquaintances, who shall come to perform
their last office of love to me, will not come out of expectation of
anything, but out of pure love and respect to the memory of their
deceased friend.” This Edmund Calamy was committed to Newgate on
January 6, 1663, the first Nonconformist who suffered for disobedience
to the Act of Uniformity. Set free by order of the King, he was driven
through the ruins of London, and the sight, it is said, broke his
heart. He died on October 29, 1666, and was buried in the ruins of his
church, “as near to the place where his pulpit had stood as they could
guess.”
Lastly, Thomes Rich (dated July 31, 1672), devised a messuage and
premises in Lime Street, St. Andrew Undershaft, the rents to be
distributed as to 40s. yearly to the minister of the parish to preach
there two sermons, one on New Year’s Day, the other on the third
Tuesday in September, in thankfulness to God for the preservation of
the parish from the Fire.
VII
Appended to the will of Thomas Appletree, a lengthy document, is the
following memorandum: “Be it remembered that on Saturday the one and
thirtieth day of March last past before the date hereof (April 27th,
1666) Thomas Appletree, of Dadington, ... Esq., lying sick in his bed,
(his brother William Appletree of Dadington aforesaid, Gentleman,
being by his bedside, and Lettice Appletree daughter of the said
Thomas Appletree being in the same chamber,) his said brother William
Appletree said thus unto him:—Brother I know you have made your will,
pray where is it? His answer was:—It is in the little trunk at my bed’s
feet.”
In this case the survivors seem to have been more anxious than the
dying man that the will should not be mislaid. They were not subject
to the delicacy of feeling of Mr. Weller in a later age. “Samivel,”
said Mr. Weller accosting his son on the morning of the funeral, “I’ve
found it, Sammy. I thought it wos there.” “Thought wot wos where?”
inquired Sam. “Your mother-in-law’s vill, Sammy,” replied Mr. Weller.
“In wirtue o’ vich, them arrangements is to be made as I told you on
last night respectin’ the funs.” “Wot, didn’t she tell you were it
wos?” inquired Sam. “Not a bit on it, Sammy,” replied Mr. Weller.
“We wos a adjestin’ our little differences, and I wos a cheerin’ her
spirits and bearin’ her up, so that I forgot to ask anythin’ about
it. I don’t know as I should ha’ done it indeed, if I had remembered
it,” added Mr. Weller, “for it’s a rum sort o’ thing, Sammy, to go
a hankerin’ arter anybody’s property, ven you’re assistin’ ’em in
illness. It’s like helping an outside passenger up, ven he’s been
pitched off a coach, and puttin’ your hand in his pocket, vile you ask
vith a sigh how he finds hisself, Sammy.”
The danger of a will’s loss or destruction preys upon some minds, a
subject which must be recurred to in the last chapter of this book.
Various expedients to facilitate the finding of the will are adopted.
Dr. Thomas Cheyney, Dean of Winchester, whose will was proved in 1760,
began a codicil thus: “Whereas by my last will (which may be found in
the innermost part of a little walnut bureau with one glass door in my
long gallery)....” Lord St. Leonards, the lawyer, made every effort for
the safety of his will, it being carefully kept in a strong-box and
securely guarded, as was thought; but when he died in 1875, and the box
was duly opened, the will was missing after all.
“Thackeray,” says G. W. E. Russell in “Seeing and Hearing,” “did not
traffic very much in wills, though, to be sure, Jos. Sedley left £1,000
to Becky Sharp, and the opportune discovery of Lord Ringwood’s will in
the pocket of his travelling-carriage simplified Philip’s career. The
insolvent swindler, Dr. Firmin, who had robbed his son and absconded
to America, left his will ‘in the tortoiseshell secretaire in the
consulting-room, under the picture of Abraham offering up Isaac.’”
A missing will is the novelist’s delight. In Miss Everett Green’s “A
Will in a Well,” among the incoherent sentences of a dying man, the
words “Search well” are overheard. But it needed an acute intellect to
realise, after every effort had been made to find a satisfactory _last_
will, that it was a disused well that should have been scoured for the
document. In Mrs. Wilfred Ward’s “Great Possessions” a lost will is
found, and redeems the testator’s reputation.
No hiding-place is too unlikely. When Lord Hailes died in 1792 no
will was to be found. The daughter and only child had given up hope
of possessing the mansion-house, but when her servants were locking
it up and closing the shutters, from behind a panel there fell the
will which secured her the estate. Harris Norman, a pedlar, who died
worth over £11,000, left a will which was found in a silk hat; and
lately a curious story was told in the Probate Court of a will found
in a clock. The deceased’s husband, it was stated, made a search for a
will, but was for some time unsuccessful. As the greater part of his
wife’s property consisted of freeholds, in which under an intestacy he
would take but a curtesy interest, it was with anxiety that the search
was made. Eventually, at the back of a clock on the mantelpiece, the
will was found, betrayed by the stopping of the clock. Not unnaturally
a charge of forgery was set up. It is certainly dangerous, for more
than one reason, to hide a will securely away. In this case the judge
pronounced in its favour. “What more likely than after the deceased had
been worried to make a will for little Hilda (her niece), she thought
that she would leave her property to her husband? Was it likely that
she would tell any one? Was it not likely that she would put it in some
place—as in the back of the clock—which would not be opened for some
days after her death?”
On the other hand, the High Court of Bengal, in 1903, refused to admit
to probate a will which was stated to have been searched for and found
in a tin box formerly in the possession of one who was said to have
been the custodian of the will in his lifetime, and the Court said: “We
hold that fraud and deceit were practised at the finding of the will.”
Certainly wills are given sometimes to friends for custody, and then
themselves bequeathed. Charles Johnson, for instance, seaman of the
frigate _Coventry_, in his will dated 1778, stated that he had two
wills in his possession, and these at his death he gave to his friend
Henry Dye, belonging to the same ship.
“Memorandum, that on the three and twentieth day of July, 1595, this
will was found in the little black trunk of the said Elenor Clarke
standing at her bed’s foot, being found locked and opened in the
presence of us John Worsopp, William Payne, John Smithe.” The heirs
of Charles William Minet, who died in 1874, a descendant of a family
which had fled from France at the persecution of Protestants in 1686,
were not so fortunate. No will could be found, and his manor-house was
sold. But in 1905, on a death in another branch of the family, some
neglected cases were examined, and in one of them lay the will. It
showed that the estate had been settled in tail, and it was accordingly
repurchased, that the testator’s intentions might not be frustrated.
But intentionally or unintentionally, a will may be destroyed. The
romance of wills breathes from this codicil to the will of a West
Indian merchant. “Grenada, 20th March, 1795. I Simpson Strachan, of
said Island, and in the town of St. George Northant, do make this
codicil to my last will and testament dated 1786, the day and month I
do not at present recollect nor can I have recourse to said will by
reason of its being buried under ground to prevent its being burnt
by the enemy.” Sometimes a happy chance may preserve the tenour of a
will. The estate of a testatrix who died in 1872 being at the time
valueless, her will was not proved. But recent improvement in certain
property made probate a necessity. The original will, however, had been
destroyed in a fire, and only the copy of a copy remained. This copy,
though imperfectly transcribed, was admitted to probate, subject to
obvious emendations.
At other times a more serious problem is presented. A will may be
destroyed by the testator, or in his presence, but not necessarily
so as to revoke or annul it. Upon this point interesting actions
turn from time to time, and curious family histories are disclosed.
It is very difficult to decide in some cases whether the deceased
himself destroyed the will or whether at the time he approved of its
destruction; the time and temper lost, the publicity involved, show how
foolish it is to die intestate. If one wishes the estate to devolve
under the statutes for the distribution of intestates’ property, it
is still possible to make a will stating that this is the testator’s
desire.
As foolish is it to die intending that a torn will shall be valid. In
1908 a Yorkshireman died, leaving as his will one that had been torn
in fragments by his wife. Next day she pinned the pieces together, and
the matter was dismissed as a joke. The testator only laughed when it
was suggested that trouble might ensue through the tearing of the will.
“By the Wills Act a will might be revoked by tearing by the testator or
by his authority and in his presence. This will had undoubtedly been
torn up in his presence, but there was no evidence that it had been
done by his authority; indeed the evidence was all the other way.... No
will could be revived except by a duly executed document, and similarly
the testator could have revoked his will by another will had he wished
to do so. It was, however, clear that he always regarded the torn will
as a good one and examined it to see if it was legible. Something had
been said as to all Yorkshiremen being lawyers. They were a hard-headed
people, and the testator’s view was quite correct.” So said the learned
Judge.
Of all acts which exasperate the human sense of piety and justice,
perhaps the most exasperating is the destruction of a will after the
death of the deceased. The destruction of the will of George I. by his
son George II. is famous in history, but in view of evidence recently
adduced we need not enlarge upon the traditional interpretation. Some
wills, indeed, are better destroyed.
For the purposes of poetry, drama, and fiction, this theme is obvious
but not negligible. There is a remarkable similarity between the
atmosphere of Sir Arthur Pinero’s dramas and George Crabbe’s poems.
Each, too, has chosen in one instance the criminal destruction of a
will to build upon, and while Crabbe’s poem, “The Will,” is slight and
Pinero’s drama, “The Thunderbolt,” is subtle, yet poet and dramatist
are worth comparing.
In “The Will” a father wishes to disinherit his unworthy son and leave
his estate to a worthy friend. The friend dissuades him, but keeps the
first will in case the father should revive it.
“The Will in hand, the Father musing stood,
Then gravely answered, ‘Your advice is good;
Yet take the paper, and in safety keep;
I’ll make another will before I sleep,
But if I hear of some atrocious deed,
That deed I’ll burn, and yours will then succeed.
Two thousand I bequeath you. No reproof!
And there are small bequests—he’ll have enough;
For if he wastes, he would with all be poor,
And if he wastes not, he will need no more.’
The Friends then parted: this the Will possess’d,
And that another made—so things had rest.”
Until the father died.
“Unhappy Youth! e’er yet the tomb was closed,
And dust to dust conveyed in peace reposed,
He sought his father’s closet, searched around,
To find a will: the important will was found.
Well pleased he read, These lands, this manor, all
Now call me master! I obey the call!
Then from the window looked the valley o’er,
And never saw it look so rich before.
He viewed the dairy, viewed the men at plough,
With other eyes, with other feelings now,
And with a new-formed taste found beauty in a cow.
The distant swain who drove the plough along
Was a good useful slave, and passing strong!
In short, the view was pleasing, nay, was fine,
‘Good as my father’s, excellent as mine!’
Again he reads,—but he had read enough;
What followed put his virtue to a proof.
‘How this? to David Wright two thousand pounds!
A monstrous sum! beyond all reason!—zounds!
This is your friendship running out of bounds.
Then here are cousins, Susan, Robert, Joe,
Five hundred each. Do they deserve it? No!
Claim they have none—I wonder if they know
What the good man intended to bestow!
This might be paid—but Wright’s enormous sum
Is—I’m alone—there’s nobody can come—
’Tis all his hand, no lawyer was employed
To write this prose, that ought to be destroyed!
To no attorney would my father trust:
He wished his son to judge of what was just,
As if he said, My boy will find the Will,
And, as he likes, destroy it or fulfil.
This now is reason, this I understand—
What was at his, is now at my command.
As for this paper, with these cousiny names,
I—’tis my Will—commit it to the flames.
Hence! disappear! now am I lord alone:
They’ll groan, I know, but, curse them, let them groan.’”
Needless to say, Wright inquires for the will, and is told that
there is none. After expostulation and discreet delay, the friend is
satisfied that the will is destroyed: to the son’s consternation a copy
of the first will is produced, and David Wright becomes the lawful heir.
In “The Thunderbolt” the simple theme is drawn out with quiet but
subtle skill. An elder brother dies, rich and with one child only, a
natural daughter. The family, upon whom nature has showered neither
excellence nor wealth, assembles with all the gloom and all the
curiosity appropriate to the occasion. It appears that there is no will
forthcoming; the daughter therefore will have no share in the estate,
the brothers and a sister being entitled between them. But when all is
thought to be settled and safe, when each has devised a new scheme and
scale of life, a brother breaks in upon the smug conclave announcing
that there was a will, but that he had destroyed it. His story breaks
down, and the act is traced to his wife who nursed the deceased on
his death-bed, accidentally found the will, and after his death
deliberately destroyed it. The poor daughter finds that her father has
not forgotten her; the selfish family is thunderstruck. Such is the
character, and hence the name, of the play.
In Sir Arthur Pinero’s drama no lawsuit follows, all parties agreeing
in a compromise. But in real life probate actions are a rich source of
intimate dramas and revelations. From them innumerable details emerge:
threats and cajolery, rights and wrongs, loves and hates, stand out
with all their tender or terrible insistence. In fiction inevitably
they find a place. In “Mr. Meeson’s Will” Sir Henry Rider Haggard has
discovered an extraordinary theme, but he has not shown the art which
made the ordinary theme of “The Thunderbolt” a subtle and telling play.
Mr. Meeson is outraged by his nephew’s plain-speaking, which reminds
him of his unrighteous dealings, and in a rage cuts him out of his
will. The girl on whose behalf the nephew was to be disinherited is,
by a strange course of events, thrown with Mr. Meeson on a deserted
island, with two sailors and a child only besides. In terror of death,
which swiftly overtakes him, Mr. Meeson would revive his former will,
but there is nothing with or upon which to write it. The only possible
method is to tattoo the dying man’s desires upon human flesh, and this
is done by one of the sailors upon the back of the tortured girl. She
is rescued by a passing ship; and on returning home a probate action,
such as never yet had been, was fought out to a triumphant conclusion.
Another story, scarcely less remarkable in its own way, is revealed
by Edmund Gosse, in “Father and Son,” of an action set in motion by a
son who was grievously wronged by one of the “saints”—the sect among
whom Mr. Gosse’s father held an honourable place. This member of the
community had persuaded a rich man, well on in years, to board with
him, and when he died a will was produced leaving his entire fortune to
the “saint” with whom he lodged. Yet the old man had a son surviving.
In time the son came home from overseas, and the universal legatee
of the will was arrested. The trial disclosed that the old man had
been “converted” by the “saint,” and had disinherited his son as an
“unbeliever.” The “saint” had traced the signature to the will by
drawing the testator’s fingers over the document, when he was already
comatose. To the last the “saint” declared his belief that he had
done no wrong, that it was righteous to wrest the money to pious and
charitable uses. _Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum._
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The “Dictionary of National Biography” says: “Born December 23,
1621, probably at Sellinge, Kent.”