Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/151

 GREEN V. GOEDON. 143 �residue of the large estate of her aunt, the late Sylvia Ann Howland, of New Bedford, after the payment of many lega- cies and the establishment of several smaller trusts. This residue was devised to trustees who were to pay the net in- come to the plaintifï during her ],ife, and at her death to divide the principal among ail the lineal descendants, then living, of Gideon Howland, the grandfather of the testratrix. The defendants are the trustees. �The settlement of the estate of the testatrix was delayed by litigation for several years; and in 1870 a compromise was agreed to by ail the persons directly interested in the estate, and was conôrmed by the supreme judicial court of Massa- chusetts, by which the amount to be paid the legatees, other than the plaintiff, was fixed, and the defendants, as trustees, were to take the assets after the payment of these legacies, and the debts and charges of administration, and divide said residual portion into two parts : first, the earnings of the estate since the death of Sylvia Ann Howland; and second, the remainder of said residue. The agreement then pro- ceeded : "And said trustees shall, under the provisions of the trust, account for said first part to said Hetty H. Green and her legal representatives ; and said second part shall consti- tute the principal of the trust fund, to be retained and kept by them as trustees, under the provisions of said will and codicil." By a supplemental agreement between the plaintifï and the defendants it was explained that "earnings," in the former agreement, should mean earnings less interest on the legacies. �These agreements, for a breach of which this action was brought, are printed in the report of Manlell v. Green, 108 Mass. 277. The plaintiff's action was for certain dividends of stock, amounting to a very considerable sum, received by the defendants from the administrators, which the plaintiff insisted should be given to her as "earnings," and which the defendants considered to belong to capital. �A bill in equity to settle this question had remained dor-, mant for some years for want of parties. See Gordon v. Green, 113 Mass. 259. ��� �