Lord Chesterfield’s Will
The will of the celebrated Lord Chesterfield contains this prelude:—“Satiated with the pompous follies of this life, of which I have had an uncommon share, I would have no posthumous ones displayed at my funeral, and therefore desire to be buried in the next burying-place to the place where I shall die, and limit the whole expense of my funeral to 100l.” Shortly after comes the following clause:—“The several devises and bequests hereinbefore and hereinafter given by me to and in favour of my said godson, Philip Stanhope, shall be subject to the condition and restriction hereinafter mentioned—that is to say, that in case my said godson, Philip Stanhope, shall at any time hereafter keep or be concerned in the keeping of any race-horse or race-horses, or pack or packs of hounds, or reside one night at Newmarket, that infamous seminary of iniquity and ill-manners, during the course of the races there, or shall resort to the said races, or shall lose in any one day at any game or bet whatsoever the sum of 500l., then, and in any of the cases aforesaid, it is my express will that he, my said godson, shall forfeit and pay out of my estate the sum of 5,000l. to and for the use of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, for every such offence or misdemeanour as is above specified, to be recovered by action for debt in any of his Majesty’s courts of record at Westminster.” The will entails a similar penalty on the letting of Chesterfield House. The late Lord Chesterfield, who was son of the man on whom these liabilities were imposed, certainly let Chesterfield House; and had, we will venture to say, passed some nights at the “infamous seminary of iniquity and ill-manners.” His ancestor vested the infliction of the penalty in the reverend hands of the Dean and Chapter, to mark, by a sort of Parthian dart, his sense of the grasping spirit he considered they had evinced in their dealings with him respecting the land on which his house was built, and to show what a rigid enaction of the penalty imposed he anticipated from such sharp practitioners.