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Show SIGNED THE WRONG WILL. He Pat Hla Name to Hi Wife's Will In-stead In-stead of His Own. A very curious case, in which a husband hus-band executed a will which had been prepared for his wife, and the wife executed exe-cuted a will which had been prepared for her husband, has recently been declared de-clared by the general term ' of the supreme court of New York, in the Fourth judicial department depart-ment (.Syracuse). John and Jane Nelson, Nel-son, being husband and wife, wanted to make wills, each in favor of the other, oth-er, and employed William Cowie to prepare pre-pare the instrument, which he did in due form. The wills, says the Boston Argus, were read and placed upon the table for signature. Each then signed one of the wills, made the requisite declaration declara-tion as to the character of the instrument, instru-ment, and asked the subscribing witnesses wit-nesses to sign. After execution the wills were sealed up in an envelope, which was not opened until after the husband's death, when it was discovered discov-ered for the first time that each had by mistake signed the will intended for the other. The wife brought suit in the supreme court to correct her hus-band.s hus-band.s mistake in signing the wrong will by reforming the language of the will which he did actually execute, so as to make it conform to that which he certainly intended to execute. Her complaint was dismissed at the special terrn.however, and the appellate branch of the supreme court holds that the dismissal was right. Mr. Justice Jlanin, in the opinion of the general term, says in substance that there is no will to correct, because the husband did not make any will at all. The in-strumsnt in-strumsnt that he executed was his wife's will and of no more legal significance signifi-cance than if it had been a blank piece of paper. No precisely similar case ia reported in New York, but there are English and Pennsylvania decisions in point adverse to the position of the wife. |