tinction. The facts here are the words employed by the testator, and since language is a much more adequate instrument for conveying subtleties of meaning than any other form of expression, the facts are of necessity exceedingly complex. It is moreunlikely that undistinguishable sets of facts have already been adjudicated upon in the case of wills than in

any

other branch of law; but if they have been the subject of decision, a Court of co-ordinate jurisdiction is as much bound by those decisions in the cases of wills as in any other branch of law. The frequent dicta, therefore, to be found in the reports against citing cases upon the construction of wills only come to this, that it is useless to cite cases which have no application, and that in all probability the cases cited will be found to have none. Even with regard to this latter point it will not be safe to be too confident. Cases of construction are so numerous, originality even in “nonsense” is so rare, that there will nearly always be similar cases, or, at any rate, cases instructive even by their distinguishability.

The present work has been written from the point of view which I have thus endeavoured to indicate. Wherever rules of construction are spoken of in the following pages, the meaning is, that certain words have received a particular interpretation by the Courts, and that words not reasonably distinguishable will receive the same interpretation when they occur again, or, in other words, that certain rules of construction will prevail in the absence of an intention to the contrary. The rules of coustruction here discussed are,

а

in fact, no more than a collection of arguments for or against the different constructions which may suggest themselves in the interpretation of the meaning of testators.

November, 1876.