Page:On the forfeiture of property by married women.djvu/18

 another, made incapable of alienation, and given over to be dealt with by deeds and wills, or else to go to children or next of kin whom neither may wish to benefit.

I cannot now follow this into further detail; but I will ask anybody to imagine the faces of some honest carpenter and his wife, when a legacy of £50 has just accrued to the latter, and when they have been discussing how pleasant it will be to buy that much-wanted stock of timber or some better machinery and to extend their operations, or to start son John in business, or daughter Anne in marriage, and when they have just been told that Mr. Raikes's Act has benignly settled all these matters for them, and that the £50 cannot be dealt with except by His Honour the County Court judge, and that nothing of it except the income can be enjoyed during the marriage, unless they can prevail upon him, after a formal hearing, to make some different arrangement in accordance with the practice of the Court of Chancery. How grateful our honest friends would feel towards such legislators! And how much of the fund would remain after all the business was settled! That such an Act would benefit lawyers and, on a short-sighted view, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is not to be doubted; neither is it to be doubted that it would be a frightful plague among the poorer classes.

And how would it affect the husband who swoops down upon his wife periodically for supplies? Her cash, her bed, her chairs, her crockery, nay the very bread and butter she may have laid out for her meal, would it seems still belong to him; all these things being "transferable by mere delivery." She too, has, we will say, a legacy of £50. He is the trustee of it until a legal proceeding is taken to displace him. Upon her death he is her successor in the enjoyment of the income; and whatever her necessities may be, not a penny of the capital can be employed in their relief, unless with his consent and after fresh legal proceedings which may or may not be successful. Such provisions appear to be as inefficient against the evil-doer as they are oppressive upon the innocent.

The foregoing provisions relate to gross amount of property, irrespective of the wife's earnings. With respect to earnings, the Bill provides that when a wife can show that for six months she has earned more than half the expenses of her family the judge of the County Court shall have power to grant her a