For the sake of convenience, we may assume that the supposed office building shall contain fifteen offices, and that the annual balance in the case of each office, determined as has been shown in the preceding pages, shall be five hundred and forty-nine dollars.

The annual summary for the entire building, and consequently the yearly' indication of the condition of the investment, may now be made out as is illustrated on the following page. If such shall be desired, quarterly instead of yearly summaries may be made in a similar manner, but since the year is the only division of time for which the kinds of expenses will be similar and complete (thus taxes, water rates, etc., are paid annually) the annual summary will be found to be the more satisfactory.

The result of the summary, in the case of the supposed office building, will be a discovery of the fact that, after the payment of all expenses and six per cent. upon the amount of the investment, and proper allowance for the sinking fund, the building has earned a balance or surplus of over seventeen hundred dollars. If the satisfactory percentage of interest upon the investment had been determined upon as five, the balance or surplus would have been over thirtytwo hundred dollars. The balance may also be determined by omitting from the debit side of the summary the item

six per cent. on $150,000, $9,000," in which case the balance will be $10,717, or 71 per cent., net, upon the amount of the investment.

CHAPTER XI

DESCENT AND DISTRIBUTION OF PROPERTY.

THER

WILLS

HERE are few events belonging to the future which generally cause greater anxiety and more arduous consideration among persons of means than the disposition of their property after their deaths. Lawyers of considerable experience in this branch of the law will be able to bear testimony to the eagerness and anxiety which are so often manifested by well-to-do clients with regard to the making of their wills and the satisfactory distribution of their property after their deaths. More especially is this condition noticeable among persons of advanced age and enfeebled health who are possessed of large means. And surely it will not be entirely idle to remark that high-minded and sympathetic lawyers will faithfully strive at once to set at rest these troubled thoughts, and to make use of every fair precaution that the rightful wishes of their clients, with regard to the management of their properties after their deaths, shall not fail of substantial fulfilment. Perhaps in

this, more than in any other way, will the conscientious lawyer be able best to contribute to the incalculable usefulness and beneficence of his grand profession; for he cannot fail to know that a deep solicitude, on the part of a just and good man, with regard to the future employment of his property, is born of a union of all the best elements of humanity. Not in selfishness or in pride does the good man struggle long and diligently with this weighty problem, but rather in fidelity to his earthly trusts, in kindness, in justice, in self-forgetfulness, and in protecting love. And when all

the possibilities of right and wrong provisions, with regard to the disposition of one's property after death, shall be taken into consideration-including, as they must, the comfort and security or the suffering and insecurity of loved ones, and the improvement, education, and refinement, or the decline and retrograding of families- little wonder is to be excited by the studious care which the good and wise bestow upon such important and far-reaching matters. Nor can the necessity of the most careful and minute provisions for the disposal of property after death be too strenuously urged upon all persons who shall be possessed of considerable fortunes.

It is because of the great importance of the subject that the laws of all civilized lands prescribe, with such great care and exactness, the methods by which the property of persons who shall die without making wills shall be divided among their surviving relatives. These laws, which are called the laws of intestate succession, and for the distribution of the estates of intestates, differ considerably in the different States of our country, with regard to the exact provisions which are applicable to the various cases which may arise; and, except for the making of the statement that the real and personal property of intestates will generally be equally divided among their children (children of deceased children receiving the portions which their parents would have taken if they had been living), subject to the widows' dowers and other rights, and subject to certain provisions for surviving husbands, no attempt to explain their provisions need be made here.

It may be remarked, however, that all intelligent persons of property may profitably, by examinations of the statutes of the States in which they live, or by the aid of lawyers, make themselves generally familiar with the laws of their own States governing the descent of real property and the distribution of the personal property of intestates. And it may also be remarked that, if persons of property shall not fail to take the precaution of having their wills made, there will be little actual need of studying the laws which are