Page:Confessions of an English opium-eater (IA confessionsofeng00dequrich).pdf/215

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APPENDIX.
205

delicacy, and consideration for my feelings: I assure them they will do me too much honour by 'demonstrating' on such a crazy body as mine: and it will give me pleasure to anticipate this posthumous revenge and insult inflicted upon that which has caused me so much suffering in this life. Such bequests are not common: reversionary benefits contingent upon the death of the testator are indeed dangerous to announce in many cases: of this we have a remarkable instance in the habits of a Roman prince—who used, upon any notification made to him by rich persons that they had left him a handsome estate in their wills, to express his entire satisfaction at such arrangements, and his gracious acceptance of those loyal legacies: but then, if the testators neglected to give him immediate possession of the property, if they traitorously 'persisted in living' (si vivere perseverarent, as Suetonius expresses it), he was highly provoked, and took his measures accordingly.—In those times, and from one of the worst of the Cæsars, we might expect