In the year 1784 there was probated in England, the last will and testament of one, M. Fortune Ricard, a teacher of arithmetic. It seems that in his eighth year, his grandparent had given him a small sum of money, and directed him to add the interest to the principal each year, and at his death to employ the result in good works for the repose of their souls. The testator was in his seventy-first year at the time of his death. He divided the fund into five parts. At the end of one hundred years, one part was to be given for the best theological dissertation proving the lawfulness of putting money out at interest. At the end of two hundred years, the second part was to be expended for prizes for distinguished, virtuous actions, literature and other purposes. At the end of three hundred years, the third part was to be used in establishing five hundred patriotic banks in France, lending money without interest. At the end of four hundred years, the fourth part was to be expended in the building of a hundred towns to accommodate the people of France. At the end of five hundred years, the fifth part was to be used in paying off the national debts of England and France. The will concludes with a hope for the success of these enterprises, above all, that his example would enkindle the emulation of patriots, princes and public bodies, and cause them to give attention to this new and most powerful and invaluable means of serving posterity. THE NOBEL PRIZES Alfred Bernard Nobel, a Swedish inventor and philanthropist, was born at Stockholm in 1833, and died in 1896. He was a student of the distinguished John Ericsson: he was educated in St. Petersburg, and studied mechanical engineering in the United States: he was granted patents by the United States on nitroglycerin and dynamite: his patents were very numerous, there being filed in Great Britain one hundred and twenty-nine. In 1875, he controlled fifteen dynamite factories in different parts of the world. He is best known by his will in which he founded the Nobel Prize Fund of $9,200,000, reduced by taxation to $8,400,000, the interest on which is annually divided into five equal parts, and awarded as prizes to the person who shall have made, (1) the most important invention or discovery in the domain of physics, (2) in chemistry, (3) in physiology or medicine, (4) who shall have produced in the field of literature the most distinguished work of an idealistic tendency, and, (5) who shall have most or best promoted the interest of universal peace.