Ancient, Curious, and Famous WillsHarris, Virgil M. (Virgil McClure)
History
Ancient, Curious, and Famous Wills
Harris, Virgil M. (Virgil McClure)
Wills
He leaves 100 livres to the Sieur Jacques Barillot of Geneva; he
appoints as his heir Madame Françoise-Louise de la Tour Comtesse de
Warens, to whom he declares it his wish to pay over and above this, the
sum of 2000 livres to cover the expenses of his board during ten years.
Finally he recognizes a debt of 700 livres in favor of the Sieur
Charbonnel, a tradesman of Chambéry, for goods delivered and money lent.
The will is signed by Claude Morel (procureur au sénat), Antoine Bonne
des Echelles, Jacques Gros de Vanzy, Antoine Bouvard, Pierre Catagnole
and Pierre Cordonnier. The seventh witness, Antoine Forraz de Bissy, is
declared “illitéré.” This act was registered 22d of July, 1737, in fol.
662 of the second book of the year 1737.
According to all appearance this will was not engrossed, and Rousseau,
whose life was so checkered, and who so often changed his domicile,
probably forgot all about it, and about the accident which occasioned
it, when he drew up his Confessions.
The _Journal de Savoie_, under date 7th of April, 1820, supplies some
curious particulars as to the minutes of the above-named notary,
Rivoire, among which were found a power of attorney to Jacques Barillot
by Rousseau, to withdraw at Geneva the rights of his mother Suzanne
Bernard. This document is dated 12th of July, 1737, and registered on
the 15th of the same month.
Rousseau, born at Geneva, 28th of June, 1712, died at Ermenonville, 2d
of July, 1778.
WILL OF LORD ST. LEONARDS
The necessity that there should be some better fashion for the safe
keeping of wills, during the lifetime of testators, than at present
exists, is, perhaps, more vividly portrayed in the case of the late Lord
St. Leonards than in any other on record. In this case we have the loss
of the will, not only, of one of the astutest of lawyers, the most
orthodox of conveyancers, but of a man who had made it his chief
pleasure and study during the last four years of his life to provide for
the disposition of his worldly wealth, when his Creator should summon
away his spirit from earth, and return his mortal frame to the dust from
which He had made it. Moreover, the testator is no less a person than
the very ingenious conveyancer, Lord Chancellor of England, and author
himself of that famous “Handy-book,” in which men are exhorted in the
most convincing manner to make due and thorough disposition of their
earthly possessions. Here, during the years he had been engaged in
making his will, the greatest care was evinced for the preservation of
the precious document, as it was not only kept locked up in a box, but
during his Lordship’s illness the Honorable Miss Charlotte Sugden, his
daughter, took charge of the box and retained it in her custody until
her father should be able to leave his room, when it was replaced by her
in its ordinary position, and where it remained until his last illness,
when she again took charge of it, and in whose custody it continued
until his Lordship’s death in January, 1875.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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