You know the miser's mind;
You know the miser, and you sensed
His purpose; still, you're blind."

Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, lib. XIV, chap. i, writes in
scathing terms against the infamous practice of paying assiduous court
to old people for the purpose of obtaining a legacy under their wills.
"Later, childlessness conferred advantages in the shape of the greatest
authority and Lower; undue influence became very insidious in its quest
of wealth, and in grasping the joyous things alone, debasing the true
rewards of life; and all the liberal arts operating for the greatest good
were turned to the opposite purpose, and commenced to profit by
sycophantic subservience alone."

And Ammianus Marcellinus, lib. XVIII, chap. 4, remarks: "Some there are
that grovel before rich men, old men or young, childless or unmarried, or
even wives and children, for the purpose of so influencing their wishes
and them by deft and dextrous finesse."

That this profession of legacy hunting is not one of the lost arts is
apparent even in our day, for the term "undue influence" is as common in
our courts as Ambrose Bierce's definition of "husband," or refined
cruelty, or "injunctions" restraining husbands from disposing of
property, or separate maintenance, or even "heart balm" and the
consequent breach of promise.




CHAPTER 119. The rite of the Persians: