ANCIENT ROYAL WILLS. THE oldest English will on record is that of Alfred the Great, in the origi nal Saxon, and printed by the Clarendon Press rn 1788, with a preface and two trans lations, — one literal and the other free. It was preserved in a register of the Abbey of Newminstcr, at Winchester, founded by Alfred; and the entry, or exemplification, appears to have been made between 1028 and 1032. This curious document begins by reciting a devise of Ethelwolf to his three sons, of whom Alfred was the youngest, and the manner in which property had at length come to the possession of Alfred on the death of his brothers. He gives certain specified lands to each of his three sons; certain manors to each of his three daugh ters; others to his two nephews; five or six manors to his cousin; "And to my two sons one thousand of pounds, to each five hundred of pounds; and to my eldest daughter, and to the middlemost, and to the youngest, and to Ealhwith.to them four, four hundred of pounds, to each one hun dred of pounds." There is no mention of the crown; and the will of the greatest king of the Saxon dynasty contains nothing to distinguish it from that of a wealthy franklin or alderman invoking, as was not unusual, the sanction and support of the Witenagemote to the .disposal of his pos sessions. When Sobieski, the heroic King of Poland, was on his deathbed, and was exhorted by an attendant bishop to make a will, he re fused, saying: "We kings, to our sorrow, are not obeyed while living; can we expect to be obeyed after we are dead? " A good many of the wisest have formed such expec tations notwithstanding; and the notion that dominions and subjects were disposable like chattels naturally enough prevailed in times when the constitution was unsettled and the
prerogative undefined. Thus William the Conqueror made no scruple of devising the newly-acquired realm of England to his sec ond son, William Rufus, the succession of Normandy and Maine having been already assigned to Robert. His will appears to have been nuncupatory; for he is described as making a long and pathetic speech on his deathbed, in the course of which he named the sums which were to be distributed amongst religious communities and the poor. William Rufus' manner of death left him no time for testamentary dispositions; and all we are told respecting Henry I. is that he ordered his natural son, Robert, Earl of Gloucester, to take ¿60,000 out of his treas ure to be distributed amongst his servants and soldiers, and directed his body to be buried at Reading Abbey, where no memo rial of him remains. Stephen died intestate; and Henry II. was content, as regards the crown and its appurtenances, to permit the received law of succession to take its course. His will merely recites a distribution already made of various sums of money to religious houses (including the Knights Templars and Hospitallers), and towards the marriage of "poor and free women wanting aid." The conclusion is a solemn appeal to his sons and the heads of the English Church to watch over the fulfillment of his behests. Richard I. 's will was nuncupatory, like the Conqueror's. Hovenden relates that : "When the king's life was despaired of, he devised the kingdom of England and all his other dominions to his brother, and made all present swear fidelity to this said John, and ordered his castles and three parts of his treasure to be delivered to him, and all his jewels he devised to his nephew, Otho, King of the Germans, and directed a fourth of his treasure to be distributed amongst his ser.
