placed before the attorney, and put the empty box behind him on the
floor. Then he and the other man sat at the far end of the table;
the latter took out a big notebook and several pencils, and put them
before him. He was evidently a shorthand-writer. Mr. Trent removed
the tape from the bundle of papers, which he placed a little distance
in front of him. He took a sealed envelope from the top, broke the
seal, opened the envelope, and from it took a parchment, in the folds
of which were some sealed envelopes, which he laid in a heap in front
of the other paper. Then he unfolded the parchment, and laid it
before him with the outside page up. He fixed his glasses, and said:

"Gentlemen, the sealed envelope which you have seen me open is
endorsed 'My Last Will and Testament--ROGER MELTON, June, 1906.'
This document"--holding it up--"is as follows:


"'I Roger Melton of Openshaw Grange in the County of Dorset; of
number one hundred and twenty-three Berkeley Square London; and of
the Castle of Vissarion in the Land of the Blue Mountains, being of
sound mind do make this my Last Will and Testament on this day Monday
the eleventh day of the month of June in the year of Our Lord one
thousand nine hundred and six at the office of my old friend and
Attorney Edward Bingham Trent in number one hundred and seventy-six
Lincoln's Inn Fields London hereby revoking all other wills that I
may have formerly made and giving this as my sole and last Will
making dispositions of my property as follows:

"'1. To my kinsman and nephew Ernest Halbard Melton Esquire, justice
of the Peace, Humcroft the County of Salop, for his sole use and
benefit the sum of twenty thousand pounds sterling free of all Duties