as though these had been legitimate.[400] It should be added that Florentine custom did not allow natural children to be left without some means of support, or without provision for their education, as is shown by many still existing wills. In the case of males, the father generally tried to obtain employment for them; in the case of females, to find them husbands, and he recommended them to the care of his legitimate heirs. The husband succeeded to his wife's dowry, failing children or other near descendants. Of her extra-dotal property he was entitled to one-third, and the wife could not dispose of her dowry either by will or donation, so as to exclude her husband or children.[401] XIII. Besides the law of succession, there is another branch of the Italian statutes in which the action of the political idea upon civil law is equally apparent, namely, that which treats of rights between neighbours, and of the obligations _in solidum_ attaching not only to the members of families, but likewise to the members of sects and associations. We have already observed that these are carried so far as to make one member responsible for another's debts, and even for his delicts: this is a law to which we shall have more than once to return and give our attention. When real property is sold, we find that the agnates and cognates have always a preferential right of purchase. In the March of Ancona, the blood-relations of a prisoner condemned to death may be compelled to purchase his estate.[402] At Bologna, relations are often made legally responsible for one another, and, by the rules of the corporations of merchants in that city, the brothers of any bankrupt, who have lived in community with him within a month before his failure, are held responsible for his debts--even if they have separated from him since that time.[403]