The Sun.
London, England, 1858-07-06 00:00:00

1 sss

' male lineal descendants" of his three eons.
Having thus done what he liked with his own,
and excluded all his living progeny from all benefit,
he ends with a whine to the Legislature worthy of
Shylock appealing against mercy—he had earned
his money with honesty and industry, and he hoped
the Legislature would not alter his will. Of course,
the first thing that followed was a Chancery suit of
the fattest bulk. The common-sense view •of the
case would have been to set aside the will, as the
product of a diseased mind—a mind rendered
morbid as to its disposing powers by dwelling
upon an irrational object. But Lords Loughborough
and Alvanley and Eldon, and judges of kindred
sympathies, seem to have been. led by their love of
art to admire the skill with which the technicalities
of our blessed real property law had been adapted
to the object of this old trader. Perhaps, also, they
saw something eminently sane and matter-of-fact
in this good old sordid vice of accumulation, or
were excited to admiration by seeing the meanest
vice of man expanded into something like sublimity
in its gigantesque proportions. The litigation went
up to the House of Lords, and the will was con-
firmed. This affair naturally made a great noise.
The Legislature took it up, and although they
would not set aside the will by an ex post facto
law, they branded Peter Thelluson's memory with
the imputation of "vanity, illiberality and folly ;"
and enacted by statute, 39th and 40th of George
111., cap. 98, that the power of devising property
for the purpose of accumulation shall be restrained
in general to 21 years after the death of the testa-
tor. Persons of an arithmetical and statistical turn
of mind also occupied themselves with the matter,
and, with the aid .of life insurance tables and
Cocker, they calculated that this fund, accumulat-
ing at compound interest, could not amount to less
than nineteen millions at the moment of distribu-
tiOn, and would very probibly reach the tremen-
dous figure of Chirly-taro millions. But " nothing is
so false as facts, except figures." The calculators
had forgotten to take account of that unknown
quantity which must, in practical matters, be repre-
sented, not by the letter " x," but by the word
" litigation." Contemporaneously with the Chan-
cery suit to set aside the will there was a cross•suit
to have the trusts of the will performed under the
direction of the Court of Chancery. That suit is
now sixty years old, and, although children and
grandchildren are dead, the -suit eis as hale and
lively as it was in their earliest youth. That suit
was the true heir to Peter Thellusson, and it is still
spending his money like a frolicksome young cor-
net. Necessarily, there were ether suits. There
were suits about post-testament acquisitions of
real property, there were suits about. advowsons,
there were suits about other matters, so numerous
that even equity lawyers, not stingy of their words,
are fain to describe them as " various." The care-
ful and improving •management of the Court of
Chancery has also exercised its influence upon this
estate. The Yorkshire estates have participated in
that excellent- system, which has been so uniform
in its action, that when we see a house all window-
less and unpainted, tottering and decaying, we can
predicate with a tone of undoubting conviction,
" That property is in Chancery."
The last survivor of the nice lives died in
February, 1856, and four new bills were immedi-
ately filed. The property is now to be divided, not
into thirds, but into moieties. There is, however,
a question raised as to who is entitled. Who were
the eldest male lire* descendaaits of old Peter
Thellusson in February, 18561 There are two
who are eldest in point of lineage, and two who are
eldest in point of personal age. This point is still
sub judice. •It would not be very difficult to guess :
bow it will be decided ; but that is no matter of
ours, nor would it have been a matter of the least
interest to old Peter Thellussori. His object was
to make the heap very large ; he evidently cared
not one lock of wool as to which of hiselescendants
might be the possessors. The pub!ic 'interest in
this long line of litigation is confined to its general
aspect. Peter Thellussou's clever scheme has
turned out a foolish failure. No single Thel-
lusson will stalk over the land, overshadowing our
dukes and cruihiug our barons by the magnitude
of his territorial possessions. No thirty-two mil-
lions of money are expanded into broad acres,
where men may travel and say—" Behold the con-
quests of the great Peter Thellusson." Whether
Lord Rendlesham and Charles Sabine Augustus
Thelluvon divide the estate as the eldest in lineage,
or whether Thomas and Arthur take as eldest in
years, we should equally desire to be able to call up
old Peter Thellusson to see the division of his anti-
cipated accumulations. The Court of Chancery
has so clipped and pollarded his oak, that it is net
much larger than when he left it. It would be fit
punishment for that purse-proud, vain, cruel old
man, to see that he disinherited his own children
only to fatten a generation of lawyers ; that he was
the dupe of his own subtlety, and that his name,
instead of being associated with the foundation of
a house of fabulous wealth, is only known in con-
nexion with an abertive scheme of vulgar vanity. •
—Times.
LOCAL SHARI? MARKAZIL •

LIVERPOOL—JULY 5.
STOOK EXCHANGE—TiIe market improved soon after
the opening, and closes at an advance of about 1 per cent.,
and with a much better feeling than has been shown for
some time past. The news to-day respecting the Atlantic
has so far produced no ,rest effect upon the value of the
shares ; they are nominally quoted 500 to 550, but, as may
be expected, are not 'very marketable just at present..
Subjoined are the closing prices :—Dovers, 193 2)- -Leeds
134
Northern, 22 - Caledonians; 30t 7—York and 'North
Midland, 35 R—Berwicks, 22 11-16—East Lancashire, —London and North• Western, 893 4--Sheffield, 36 I
Chester and liclyhead, 161 17i—Eastern Counties, 12 1-16
—Great Western, 501 —Lancashire and Yorkshire, 904 —Groat Western of Canada, 163 - Blackburns,
Midland, 91 I—North British, 114 i—Birkenheads, 684# Grad Trunk of Canada, 10 —Dutch Rhenish, 53 dis.

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VIRTHS.
HENLEY.—On the 3d inst., at Watfor3, Northampton-
shire, Lady Henley, of a aon.

HanvEY--On the 4th inst., at the Admiralty House,
Sheerness, the wife of Commander Henry Harvey, R.N.
of a son.
AIERcER—On the 2d inst:, at Sidmonth, the wife of Col.
Harvey Mercer, of a son.
TRAILL-2n thd 4th inst., the wife of James Christie
Traill, sq., of the Inner Temple, barrister-at-law, of
a sm.