returned the hopeful legatee, even more
noisily than before, and striding about the
apartment, which was on the first-floor. "I
can't live upon air, can I? D'ye want me to
beg in the streets?"

"Not exactly," replied my timid co-executor,
in his way; "you can't live upon air,
can you? You don't want to beg in the
streets? Pray, sir, let me implore you, sir;
my landlady's very particular, and I think
she's alarmed at the noise."

"Noise be jiggered!" continued the hopeful
legatee, "she'll be alarmed at more than
that, if I don't get fifty pound. There's no
Court o' Chancery about me; I can take care
o' myself without any law."

"Without any law, exactly, sir; pray, sir,
don't strike the table, sir, because it's not
mine."

Of course my timid co-executor was worked
upon by these violent actions to advance
various sums of money to the hopeful legatee,
at different times, until the amount had
reached something like two hundred pounds.
He complained to me that this was not the
worst effect of the legatee's visit, as his
landlady—by whom he seemed to be governed,
although he was never back in his rent—had
already began to suspect that the noisy
visitor had some mysterious claim upon him,
as an illegitimate or discarded son.

In all cases of sale and payment I had to
consult my co-executor, although his character
rendered this ceremony a purely formal
matter.

"I think," I have often said, when one of
the knotty points arose, which were
constantly presenting themselves during the
progress of our trusteeship, ''we had better
not incur any further responsibility without
the advice of our solicitor?"

"Without the advice of our solicitor?
exactly," he always replied; " we had better
not go any further without the advice of our
solicitor."

The advice of our solicitor was not worth
much when obtained, except that it gave a
legal sanction to our proceedings. On all
occasions, when a question of extraordinary
responsibility was involved, our solicitor flew
for safety to counsel's opinion. By these
means the risk (if any) was transferred from
the shoulders of the attorney, who would
have been responsible, to the shoulders of the
barrister, who was not responsible, and so it
came back in due course to us, that is, to me,
being burdened through its journey with
much writing, much talking, and much
expense.

Time and industry enabled us, at last, to
realise every variety of eccentric security,
without much loss to the estate, except a
positively inconvertible share in a joint-stock
government annuity, called a Tontine.

A Tontine is, I believe, a scheme by which
a number of persons subscribe a certain sum
each to a fund, under Treasury management,
in consideration of which payment, they each
receive a certain annuity up to the period of
their respective deaths, when the whole of
their lapsed interest is transferred to the
credit of the survivors. The one who lives
the longest thus becomes the recipient of all
the annuities of his dead partners, and when
he dies, in his turn, the yearly payment
ceases. His claim, as long as he lives, may
be transferred to any assignee, the only
condition of payment being that he shall be
produced personally at the office, except in
cases of certified illness, et cetera, when
satisfactory evidence of his existence must be
tendered.

The late Silas Nestegg, Esquire, at the
time of his death, was the holder and assignee
of a share of this kind for a considerable sum,
which had been transferred to him as
consideration for a debt by the original owner,
who was now the sole survivor—the last
man—of this particular Tontine. The
annuity payable upon this share became due
twice a-year, in two equal amounts, and
continued fruitful of labour and trouble long
after all the other duties of our trust had
been discharged and almost forgotten. The
faded female legatee had disappeared, having
got some one to marry her on the strength
of her property (the hundred pounds, less
money drawn on account) and her excellent
expectations: the hopeful legatee, who had
never been sober since the day of his coming
into his property, had killed himself by
tumbling head first from the top of an
omnibus: my feeble co-executor had married
his landlady, which produced such a marked
change in his character, that on one occasion
(probably stimulated by his wife) he positively
refused to sign a necessary document,
for fear of getting into trouble, and hinted to
our solicitor, before retiring in disgust from
active co-executorship, that I had not
consulted him upon important points of business
in a respectful and proper manner. All
these things, and many others had occurred,
and still I was left to collect the half-yearly
payments of the Tontine annuity.

It was no easy task. The annuitant was
a rather vulgar, restless man who was always
alive—and kicking. The annuity had been
purchased for him when young, by a thoughtful
relative, and he might now have been in
the quiet enjoyment of it, but for an unfortunate
tendency to insolvency. If the late
Silas Nestegg, Esquire, was always ready to
invest in any undertaking, without much
investigation, the Tontine annuitant was
always ready to conduct any undertaking,
without any special knowldge or experience.
This affinity of character may have been the
cause of bringing the two men—the dead and
the living—together in the relation of creditor
and debtor.

The Tontine annuitant, at the time when I
wanted him, could never be found. He had
no longer any interest in obtaining the