A Curious Will.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6266, 12 July 1890, Page 3

A Curious Will.

The St. Petersburg correspondent of the Daily Telegraph writes: —“ Hope deferred maketh the heart sick; and rich men well stricken in years so often cause during their lives the fondest hopes of their prospective, heirs to he indefinitely deferred, that there is positively no excuse for their continuing to do so after death, like a late inbalitant of War* saw, M.S . This gentleman died six years ago. He had confided his last will and testament to M.B , his executor, at whose house the friends and relatives gathered together after the funeral to learn their fate ; but they only heard the inscription on the envelope read, which was to the effect that the seal was to be broken on that day twelvemonth. This was sad news to many of them whoso creditors were restive and threatening; but possessing their souls, their interjections, and their adjectives in patience and in silence, they went their several ways. In 1865 they were all punctually at the tryeting place once more. Breathless was the silence —like unto that described in the second book of the iEneid, when Venus’ son was about to tell his thrilling tale. M B broke that silence and seal solemnly and i tenderly, and found inside of the envelope a somewhat smaller enclosure sealed with an ] identical seal and bearing an identical superscription : - ‘ This seal is to bo broken this day twelvemonth ; not before.” It is to be hoped that the spirit of thatdeparted citizen, if hovering at all near the spot, was not within earshot of the unoourtly ejaculations which that announcement elicited, as the disappointed j audience rose up and dispersed , nor was the ) discovery of the year following of a nature to soothe the angry feelings of the impatient relatives who mot once more under M. B ’s hospitable roof. Briefly, year after year the kith end kin of that rich man gathered together and 1 quoted Scripture 1 at the practical joker of the other world, heartily wishing him back again in this one for the nonce. The will proved to have seven seals, the last of which was broken a few days ago, when it was found that the rich man’s property was divided into four equal parts, one of which was (o be equally distributed between bis nieces and nephews ; another was left to the children of a former wet nurse ; a third was given to his friend and executor, M. B ; and a fourth was -directed to be invested till the year 1910, when it is to be handed over to that one of the nephews who is blessed with the most numerous progeny.”