58 DIVISION OF PROPERTY. [CHAP. IV. 



of them went into the drawing-room, where some &quot; ladies&quot; of 

 their own class were playing on a piano-forte ; other mechanics 

 were reading newspapers and books, but after a short stay they 

 all returned to their work. On looking at the books they had 

 laid down, I found that one was D Israeli s &quot; Coningsby,&quot; an 

 other Burns Poems, and a third an article just reprinted from 

 Frazer s Magazine, on &quot;the Policy of Sir Robert Peel.&quot; 



&quot; As we passed through Conway, seeing there was but one 

 meeting-house, I asked to what denomination it belonged. The 

 reply was, &quot;Orthodox.&quot; I went on to say that the place seemed 

 to be thriving. My informant replied, with evident satisfaction, 

 &quot;Yes, and every man here is his own tenant,&quot; meaning that they 

 all owned the houses and lands they occupied. To be a lessee, in 

 deed, of a farm, where acres may be bought so cheap, is a rare 

 exception, to the general rule throughout the United States. 

 The approach to an equal subdivision of property among children, 

 is not the result here of a compulsory law, as in France, but of 

 custom ; and I was surprised to find how much the partition is 

 modified, according to the individual views of the testator. I was 

 assured, indeed, by persons on whose authority I could depend, 

 that in nine cases out of ten the small working farmers in New 

 England do not leave their property in equal shares to their 

 children, as the law would distribute it if they died intestate. 

 It is very common, for example, to leave the sons twice as much 

 as the daughters, and frequently to give the eldest son the land, 

 requiring him to pay small legacies to the others.&quot; In the case 

 of one of my acquaintances, where the sons had larger shares 

 than the daughters, it was provided, that if one of the two 

 brothers died, the other should take all his share. As a general 

 rule, the larger the estate the greater is the inequality of partition 

 among the children. When I inquired into the manner in which 

 the twelve or fourteen largest fortunes, such as would rank as 

 considerable in England, had been bequeathed in Boston and its 

 vicinity, and in New York, I was astonished to learn that none 

 of them had been left in equal shares among the children by men 

 of English descent, the one and only exception being that of a 

 Frenchman. In the more newly settled states, there is less in- 



