Ellison was remarkable in the continuous profusion of good gifts
lavished upon him by fortune. In personal grace and beauty he exceeded
all men. His intellect was of that order to which the acquisition of
knowledge is less a labor than an intuition and a necessity. His
family was one of the most illustrious of the empire. His bride was
the loveliest and most devoted of women. His possessions had been
always ample; but on the attainment of his majority, it was discovered
that one of those extraordinary freaks of fate had been played in
his behalf which startle the whole social world amid which they occur,
and seldom fail radically to alter the moral constitution of those who
are their objects.
It appears that about a hundred years before Mr. Ellison's coming of
age, there had died, in a remote province, one Mr. Seabright
Ellison. This gentleman had amassed a princely fortune, and, having no
immediate connections, conceived the whim of suffering his wealth to
accumulate for a century after his decease. Minutely and sagaciously
directing the various modes of investment, he bequeathed the aggregate
amount to the nearest of blood, bearing the name of Ellison, who
should be alive at the end of the hundred years. Many attempts had
been made to set aside this singular bequest; their ex post facto
character rendered them abortive; but the attention of a jealous
government was aroused, and a legislative act finally obtained,
forbidding all similar accumulations.
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