Nobel's Beneficient Bequest.

Manawatu Herald, 20 January 1898, Page 3

Nobel's Beneficient Bequest.

» In reference to the cable message as to the late Mr Nobel's beneficient bequest the following extracts from the will must be interesting :— " This will, drawn up in Paris the 27th November, 1895. was opened in Stockholm the 31st December, 1896 Except donations of £100,000 to private persons (relations, intimate friends, and servants), the testator has assigned the rest of his wealth, which is estimated at from £1. 700,000 to £2,000,000, to a fund designed to promote the development of man. Messrs Ragoer, Schlidan, and Rudolf liljequist, civil engineer*, are appointed executors of the will. That part of the wfll which refers to these vast public donations runs as follows.: — ' All the rest of my realisable property is lo be adminis. t«red in the following manner— The capital •converted into Government bonds, will form a fund, the 'interest of which to ba annually distributed to those who during the past year have proved themselves of the greatest benefit to humanity. This interest will be divided into five parts, to be allotted as follows* — One part to the man who has within the scope of physical science made the most important discovery or invention ; the second to the person who has made the most important chemical discovery or improvement; the third part .to the one who has made (he most important discovery within the domain of- phy ßiology o* medicine ; the fourth part to him who in literatnre has produced the most distinguished work with ideal tendenoy; and lastly, one part given him who has worked the most for the brotherhood of man, abolishing or diminishing standing armies and forming or extending tribunals of arbitration.' The awards for physics and chemistry are distributed by the Swedish Academy of Science; those for physiological and medical works are distributed by the Korohuska Institute in Stockholm; for literature by the Academy in Stockholm; and the awards to peace advocates by a committee of five persons elected by the Norwegian Storting. The testator expresses it as his distinct wish that no regard whatever will be taken to nationality in the awards.