The hand-book of the law of legacies / containing a statement of the nature of legacies, and the accidents to which they are subjects; together with the rights of legatees, and the causes and manner of the ademption, cumulation, and abatement of their bequests

by Anonymous

GENERAL LEGACIES.

General legacies are such as are specified in a mere statement of quantity; as, A leaves to B £500, to be paid out of his personal estate, without specifying any particular portion of property out of which the sum is to be paid. Nor does it matter whether it be of money or stock; and where the testator has not the stock stated in his will, but has the wherewithal to purchase it at his death, the executor is bound to procure so much stock for the legatee. But if the terms of the will be specific, as “so much stock, standing in his name,” and he has no stock whatever, the legacy would share the fate of a specific legacy, and fail. The purpose, however, to which a general legacy is directed to be applied, will not alter its nature, however specific the object may be. Personal annuities, given by will, are also general legacies.

Legacies may be specific in one sense and pecuniary in another—being specific when they are given out of a particular fund, and not out of the estate at large; and pecuniary, as consisting only of definite sums of money, and not amounting to the gift of the fund itself, or any portion of it.

In the case of the Attorney General v. Parkin, Lord Camden recognized the distinction between a legacy of a certain sum due from a particular person, and a legacy of such debt generally; considering the former as a legacy of quantity, while the latter he deemed to be specific.