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the same be, at the time of executing or acknowledging it as
hereafter directed, of sound and disposing mind, and capable of
executing a valid deed or contract. No will, testament or codi-
cil, shall be good and effectual to pass any interest, or estate iri
any land, tenement, or incorporeal hereditament, unless the
person making the same, if a male, be of the full age of twenty-
one years, and if a female, of the full age of eighteen years.
SEC. 4. All devises and bequests of any lands or tenements,
devisable by law, shall be in writing, and signed by the party
so devising the same, or by some other person in his presence,
and by his express directions, and shall be attested and sub-
scribed in the presence of the said devisor, by three or four
credible witnesses, or else they shall be utterly void and of
none effect ; and moreover, no devise in writing of lands, tene-
ments or hereditaments, or any clause thereof, shall be revoca-
ble, otherwise than by some other will or codicil in writing, or
other writing declaring the same, or by burning, cancelling,
tearing or obliterating the same by the testator himself, or in his
presence, and by his directions and consent ; but all devises and
bequests of lands and tenements shall remain and continue in
force until the same be burnt, cancelled, torn or obliterated, by
the testator, or his directions in manner aforesaid, or unless the
same be altered by some other will or codicil in writing, or
other writing of the devisor, signed in the presence of three or
four witnesses, declaring the same, any former law or usage to
the contrary notwithstanding.
See, as to nuncupative wills, 1810, ch. 34.
CHAPTER II.
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SEC. 1. If any person, to whom a will or codicil hath been
or shall be delivered by the party making it for safe custody,
shall alter or destroy the same, without the direction of the said
party, or wilfully secrete it for the space of six months after the
death of the party shall be known to him or her, on conviction
thereof the person so offending shall be sentenced to such pun-
ishment as is inflicted by law in cases of grand larceny.
See 1809, ch. 138, by which the punishment for the offence is enlarged.
SEC. 2. It shall be lawful for any private person, in whose
possession or custody a will or codicil shall be, after the death
of the testator or testatrix, to open and read the same in the
presence of any near relatives of the deceased, who may conve-
niently have notice thereof, and of other persons, and imme-
diately thereafter to deliver the said will or codicil to the register
of wills, or the register or clerk of any office in the county autho-
rized to record wills, whose duty it shall be to keep the same
safe, until proceedings may be had for proving the same in the
said office, or until it be demanded by an executor, or other
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How wills
shall be
authentica-
ted or
proved.
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