Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/322

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
 
m’arthur v. allen.
315

common pleas should fill the vacancy, etc. The powers and duties of the executors are so familiar to those concerned that it is unnecessary here specifically to enumerate them. It is sufficient to say that the lands of the testator in Ross and Pickaway counties, constituting the bulk of the estate, were devised to the executors for the time being, with directions to collect and apply the rents as provided, until his children should all be dead, and the youngest grandchild should have attained to the age of 21 years. The lands in question were thereupon to be conveyed to his then living grandchildren in equal shares per capita; but if any grandchild should have died, leaving children, the share of such grandchild was to go to his or her children per stirpes. The final provision of the will on this subject is as follows:

“And in such final distribution of my lands it is my direction that deeds of partition shall be made to and in the name of those who shall be thus entitled thereto, and in the name and for the use of no other person whatsoever, which deeds shall be executed by my executors for the time being; and to enable my executors the more effectually to execute the powers and duties by this will devolved upon them, and to protect my said children and grandchildren against fraud and imposition, I hereby devise to my said executors, and the successors of them, all my said lands so directed to be leased and finally divided as above, and to their heirs, in trust, for the uses and purposes and objects expressed in this my will, and the performance of which is herein above directed and prescribed, to have and to hold the title thereof till such final division and partition thereof, and no longer.”

Several things are to be observed at this point. The careful hand that drew the will used words of inheritance in defining the estate of the executors. The estate was no larger than the purposes of the trust required. The controlling idea was to prevent the devolution of the title and its vesting in the devisees until they received it by the execution of the deeds of partition at the appointed time. If one of the grandchildren died before that time, though over 21 years of age, he could not devise his interest in the real estate; and if he