Goldsmith places in the mouth of one of his characters, a declaration, that he was disinherited, for liking gravy. This, however it may have been intended as a pleasantry, by the author, is, by no means, beyond the region of probability. Considerations, equally absurd and frivolous, have, occasionally, operated upon the minds of passionate and capricious people, especially in the decline of life; and, though they are sensible of the Bible truth, that they can carry nothing with them, they may, yet a little while, enjoy the prospective disappointment of another. The Testamenta Vetusta contain abstracts of numerous wills of the English kings, and of the nobility, and gentry, for several centuries, from the time of Henry second, who began to reign, in 1154. The work, as I have stated, is rare; and I am mistaken, if the general reader, any more than he, who has an antiquarian diathesis, will complain of the exhumation I propose to make of some, among the "reliques of thae antient dayes." It is almost impossible, to glance over one of these venerable testaments of the old English nobility, without perceiving, that the testator's thoughts were pretty equally divided, between beds, masses, and wax tapers. Beds, with the gorgeous trappings, appurtenant thereto, form a common subject of bequest, and of entailment, as heir-looms. Edward, the Black Prince, son of Edward III., died June 8, 1376. In his will, dated the day before his death, he bequeaths "To our son Richard,[6] the bed, which the King our father gave us. To Sir Roger de Clarendon,[7] a silk bed. To Sir Robert de Walsham, our confessor, a large bed of red camora, with our arms embroidered at each corner; also embroidered with the arms of Hereford. To Monsr. Allayne Cheyne our bed of camora, powdered with blue eagles. And we bequeath all our goods and chattels, jewels, &c., for the payment of our funeral and debts; after which we will, that our executors pay certain legacies to our poor servants. All annuities, which we have given to our Knights, Esquires, and other, our followers, we desire to be fully paid. And we charge our son Richard, on our blessing, that he fulfil our bequests to them. And we appoint our very dear and beloved brother of Spain, Duke of Lancaster,[8] &c., &c., executors," &c. Joan, Princess of Wales, was daughter of Edmund Plantagenet. From her extreme beauty, she was styled the "_Fair Maid of Kent_." I find the following record in regard to Joan--"She entered into a contract of marriage with Thomas Montacute, Earl of Salisbury; but Sir Thomas Holland, H. G., on a petition to Pope Clement VI. alleged a precontract, _consensus et concubitus_, but that, he being abroad, the Earl of Salisbury unjustly kept her from him; and his Holiness gave her to Sir Thomas."