[152] Wills, Pt. 4, Sec. 12.
[153] 1 Ch. Ca. 22.
[154] Parsons v. Winslow, 6 Mass. 169.
[155] 2 Ves. 265.
[156] Garret v. Pritty, 2 Vern. 293.
[157] The case of Bayeaux v. Bayeaux, 8 Paige, 333, is a curious example of an attempt made by a testator to regulate and control the choice of his children in marriage.
The testator died at the city of Troy, in March, 1839, leaving a widow and three infant children. By his will, made a few months before his death, and evidently without the aid or advice of counsel, he placed the following condition on a legacy to his children:
“I charge upon my children, in every possible case, and under all circumstances, never to make a matrimonial engagement, or bind themselves to any individuals by promise of marriage, without full parental approbation and consent as it regards the favored individual. And while I consider it unjust as well as unwise for a parent to coerce, or to attempt forcibly to induce a child to marry an object it cannot love, so do I also deem it without any possible excuse on the part of the child to marry without the full consent of the parents. And in the event of disobedience on the part of my child, in this respect, my wish, desire, and intention is to cut that child off from any participation of the benefits arising from any property I may leave at my decease, of every kind and description whatever.”
The provisions of the will were in many respects so vague and indefinite, that Chancellor Walworth remarked: “It is very evident that this will was drawn by the decedent himself, or by some other person equally ignorant, not only of legal language, but of legal principles.” He held that the children took the same shares as if their father died intestate.
[158] Lord Comyns’ Rep. 728.