of a dying man might exhaust the inheritance and leave only risk and labor to his successor, he was empowered to retain the Falcidian portion; to deduct, before the payment of the legacies, a clear fourth for his own emolument.  A reasonable time was allowed to examine the proportion between the debts and the estate, to decide whether he should accept or refuse the testament; and if he used the benefit of an inventory, the demands of the creditors could not exceed the valuation of the effects.  The last will of a citizen might be altered during his life or rescinded after his death; the persons whom he named might die before him, or reject the inheritance, or be exposed to some legal disqualification.  In the contemplation of these events he was permitted to substitute second and third heirs, to replace each other according to the order of the testament; and the incapacity of a madman or an infant to bequeath his property might be supplied by a similar substitution.  But the power of the testator expired with the acceptance of the testament; each Roman of mature age and discretion acquired the absolute dominion of his inheritance, and the simplicity of the civil law was never clouded by the long and intricate entails which confine the happiness and freedom of unborn generations.

Conquest and the formalities of law established the use of codicils.  If a Roman was surprised by death in a remote province of the empire he addressed a short epistle to his legitimate or testamentary heir, who fulfilled with honor, or neglected with impunity, this last request, which the judges before the age of Augustus were not authorized to enforce.  A codicil might be expressed in any mode, or in any language; but the subscription of five witnesses must declare that it was the genuine composition of the author.  His intention, however laudable, was sometimes illegal; and the invention of fidei-commissa, or trusts, arose from the struggle between natural justice and positive jurisprudence.  A stranger of Greece or Africa might be the friend or benefactor of a childless Roman, but none, except a fellow-citizen, could act as his heir.

The Voconian law, which abolished female succession, restrained the legacy or inheritance of a woman to the sum of one hundred thousand sesterces, and an only daughter was condemned almost as an alien in her father’s house.  The zeal of friendship and parental affection suggested a liberal artifice:  a qualified citizen was named in the testament, with a prayer or injunction that he would restore the inheritance to the person for whom it was truly intended.  Various was the conduct of the trustees in this painful situation; they had sworn to observe the laws of their country, but honor prompted them to violate their oath; and if they preferred their interest under the mask of patriotism, they forfeited the esteem of every virtuous mind.  The declaration of Augustus relieved their doubts, gave a legal sanction to confidential