THE COMMONWEALTH: Birth Race

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Warmed with a lively knowledge of human hypocrisy, and desiring to make the best possible disposal of certain resources which had served him, in his lifetime, jauntily and well, Charles Vance Millar, Canadian turfman, corporation lawyer, sat down to write his last will and testament. When he died recently his friends pronounced the will a practical joke, his last. Surely, a later will would be found. Then, chuckling, they read:

To seven prominent Methodist ministers of Toronto $700,000 worth of O'Keefe Brewery stock on condition that they draw dividends and vote in the management for ten years "to see whether their avarice for money was greater than their principles."

To three bitter enemies of horse-racing (W. E. Raney, onetime Attorney General of Ontario, the Honorable Newton Wesley Rowell, member of the Board of Governors of the University of Toronto, and the Rev. Ben Spence, head of the Prohibition Union) $25,000 worth of Ontario Jockey Club stock, on condition that they retain the stock for a period of years and draw dividends.

To the parents of the largest number of children born in Ontario between now and Oct. 31, 1935, the entire residue (about $1,500,000).

To a friendly priest, a sum of money to say masses, burn candles for the soul of a certain prominent citizen "who will need them, wherever he is...."

Last week, after diligent investigation, this will was pronounced genuine. Hygienists shuddered at the probable results of a ten-year birth race in Ontario. What if it be won by two mental defectives, a class notoriously prolific? How many immigrants will come chasing the prize?