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ROBINSON VS. ROBINSON. 183 to the value of the property, being very little more than one- fourth of the grantor's proportion of the proceeds of the sale. The amount to be paid by Wilson is $750, whilst the grantor's proportion of the proceeds of the sale will be very little short of $2800. If this disparity is not sufficient to shock the conscience, as some of the cases express it, it is difficult to conceive what would. But it is said, and here lies the difficulty and turning point of the case, that Robinson the grantor is and was compos mentis, and being so, and having made sale of the property, and having by his answer declared his willingness that Wilson shall enjoy the benefit of it, no one has a right to interfere and forbid it. Certainly this court would not, nor is it presumed any court would, undertake to interfere with a man's right to dispose of his own property upon any terms he pleases. He may not only sell it for an inadequate price, but he may give it away, and if he be of competent understanding, and the rights of creditors are not involved, no court has a right to say one word about it. I have been unable to discover anything in the evidence in this cause to show that the grantor was not compos mentis. Neither are the circumstances relied on suffi- ciently strong to raise a presumption of the fraud or imposition said to have been practiced by the grantee, and, therefore, if the title of the grantor to the property was such as he could absolutely dispose of, the transfer must stand and have its full effect, although the thing sold was worth four times as much as has been contracted to be given for it. Whether Robinson had a right to dispose of this property absolutely, depends upon the will under which he took it. That will, after several provisions and a clause manumitting his slaves, of whom Henry Robinson the grantor was one, contains the following clause; "I give and devise to William Rea, his heirs and assigns, all the residue of the lands I purchased from Francis H. Waters and George Robertson and wife, (which I have not already devised to Wil- liam Rea in trust for my negro boy Daniel,) and also the lands I purchased from Thomas Birely and wife, I devise to William Rea and his heirs, all in trust, to be rented out by him, and the |
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Reports of Cases in the High Court of Chancery of Maryland 1846-1854
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