Cards and Wine at his Funeral
A Frenchman, who was an enthusiastic card player, left to certain of his card-playing friends a legacy of considerable size on condition that, after placing a deck of cards inside his coffin with his body, they should carry him to the grave and should stop on the way to drink a glass of wine at a small saloon, where he had passed “so many agreeable evenings at piquet.”
Will of the Sieur Boby
An attempt to invalidate this will was made by the heirs of the testator seven years after his death, but the court pronounced in its favor. It is dated 1845.
It certainly exhibits many singularities, and there was no contesting the fact that the testator, who died at the age of ninety-six, had been remarkable for his eccentricities for many years. He had at one time possessed a fortune of about two and a half million dollars, and at his death left no more than $15,000; moreover, he had been placed under tutelage during the three last years of his life.
Several wills were found after his death, and the singularity of some of the clauses formed a plea of imbecility on the part of those who had expected to inherit his fortune.
One of these was a legacy to an old priest, to whom, although he had in his collection many paintings of sacred subjects, he bequeathed a “Cupid nestling in a bouquet of roses” to remind him, as he said, of his youthful days.
Towards the close of his life he manifested what is in France technically known as an obituary monomania, appearing entirely preoccupied with his death, and what was to become of his remains. On this subject he expressed himself thus:
“Eight-and-forty hours after my decease I desire that a post-mortem examination be made; that my heart be taken out and placed in an urn, which shall be intrusted to M. Baudoin (the undertaker). In conformity with an arrangement between him and myself, my heart is to be conveyed to a mausoleum in the department of La Mayenne, and there to be deposited as agreed.”
His epitaph was written out, and in this he had allowed himself considerable margin, as he fixed the date of his death forty-five years later than it actually occurred.