PENSION FOR A HORSE

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 220, 13 June 1936, Page 24

PENSION FOR A HORSE

Mansion Left to a Dog

A pension of 15/- a week for life for a horse. That was the provision made in the will recently of Mr. Henry R. I. Webster, a manufacture! in the Midlands, writes T.R. in the Yorkshire “Weekly Post. ’ Luckv horse But not as lucky as a dog owned by the late Miss Harriet Jay author of “When Knights Mere Bold.” When Miss Jay died four years ago she left a pension of 30/- a week for the upkeep of her dog. Nor as lucky as an Ealiug tabby cat with the imposing name “Dudly Thomas Ryder,” which received two inheritances, each of £2O a year, from two sisters who bad been its joint owners. Many strange bequests have been left during the last few years. Probably one of the strangest was that of a Carlisle woman who died about IS months ago. She left £l2OO for the upkeep of her eat provided it had no kittens. If a family arrived, it was stipulated, the money should go to the woman’s relatives. Pussy is still alive, but she has lost her inheritance. When Mr. P. K. L. Roche, of Hendon, died about four years ago, he left a fortune of £51,499. Of that, £45,000 was bequeathed to animals, and the balance went to his wife and family with whom be bad lived happily for many years.

Stranger sail was the provision in the will of a Mrs. Wcndel, member of

a family of famous New York millionaires, who left her entire mansion to her pet dog and stipulated that butlers, footmen and other servants should carry on as usual until the dog died. Iu the archives of Somerset House scores of queer wills are to be found. One made last year bequeathed £5O each to three members of Rochford Golf Club “to provide a Sunday morning remembrance of many happy reunions at the 19th hole.” Another similar oue was that of an angler who left £2O to provide an outing for the members of his club, at which he hoped good sport would bo enjoyed “and no mourning worn.” Cruelty in wills is a commonplace. “To my wife —one farthing, to he sent in an unstamped envelope,” is a typical example. Another includes the paragraph: “My estate would have been considerably larger had it not been for my unfortunate marriage with the cleverest-known legal daylight robber. My associations with this perambulating human vinegar-cruet I consider to have cost me considerably over £400.” Scores of husbands, in their wills, forbid their widows to remarry on pain of forfeiture of their inheritance. But a married woman directed her executors to seek out “some nice, good, pretty girl" who would make an affectionate second ‘wife for .her husband,