400 COLEGATE D. OWINGS* CASE.

to the promise made by the plaintiff to her late husband for the
benefit of the defendant.

There can be no doubt, that the plaintiff always admitted she
had intended to give a life-estate, at least, in her property to the
defendant. Much testimony has been collected in relation to what
the plaintiff had said since the death of her husband, as to the
manner in which she intended to provide for the defendant. But
the greater part of these declarations are proved to have been made
subsequently to that period of time when her mental decay had
commenced; and therefore, so far as they may have been intro-
duced as evidence of the affirmance of an equivocal or voidable
promise, deserve little attention. But it is of no kind of import-
ance to ascertain what were, at .any time, the limits of the plain-
tiff's intended bounty to the defendant; because, as to that her
will is the law. Therefore, all the testimony which relates to her
declarations of benevolent intentions, may be at once put out of
the case.

The question here is, not what the plaintiff at any time kindly
intended; but whether she had made such a promise as is alleged,
and what have been her admissions and acknowledgments of that
promise, if any. As to which, it appears, that when the plaintiff
was called on, at a time about the commencement of her intellectual
decay, to say whether she had actually made any such promise to
her late husband in favour of the defendant, or not; and whether
any thing was then said about her giving to the defendant any
thing less than an absolute estate of inheritance? she distinctly
acknowledged, that she had made such an unconditional promise;
and that nothing was then said about an estate for life. And the
plaintiff has since made similar acknowledgments as to the nature
and extent of her promise. The circumstance, that one of her
children had been cut off from any participation in the father's
property, because of her having promised to provide for such
child, was-calculated, from its very interesting nature, to make a
strong and lasting impression, and likely to be distinctly recollected
even after her mind had fallen into a great degree of decay.(q)

These acknowledgments of the promise are mainly corroborated
by the circumstances of the late John C. Owings' family at the
time of his death; and the disposition which he made of his estate
by his will. His other children, there spoken of, having had estates

(q) Bennet v. Vade, 2 Atk. 325.