transferee may himself be charged by the deceased with a trust
to transfer to some other person either the whole or a part of what he
receives, or even something different.
12 As has been already observed, trusts in their origin depended solely
on the good faith of the heir, from which early history they derived
both their name and their character: and it was for that reason that the
Emperor Augustus made them legally binding obligations. And we, in
our desire to surpass that prince, have recently made a constitution,
suggested by a matter brought before us by the eminent Tribonian,
quaestor of our sacred palace, by which it is enacted, that if a
testator charges his heir with a trust to transfer the whole inheritance
or some specific thing, and the trust cannot be proved by writing or
by the evidence of five witnesses--five being, as is known, the number
required by law for the proof of oral trusts--through there having been
fewer witnesses than five, or even none at all, and if the heir, whether
it be his own son or some one else whom the testator has chosen to
trust, and by whom he desired the transfer to be made, perfidiously
refuses to execute the trust, and in fact denies that he was ever
charged with it, the alleged beneficiary, having previously sworn to his
own good faith, may put the heir upon his oath: whereupon the heir may
be compelled to swear that no trust was ever charged upon him, or, in
default, to transfer the inheritance or the specific thing, as the case
may be, in order that the last wishes of the testator, the fulfilment
of which he has left to the honour of his heir, may not be defeated. We
have also prescribed the same procedure where the person charged with a
trust is a legatee or already himself a transferee under a prior trust.
Finally, if the person charged admits the trust, but tries to shelter
himself behind legal technicalities, he may most certainly be compelled
to perform his obligation.
TITLE XXIV. OF TRUST BEQUESTS OF SINGLE THINGS
Single things can be left in trust as well as inheritances; land, for
instance, slaves, clothing, gold, silver, and coined money; and the
trust may be imposed either on an heir or on a legatee, although a
legatee cannot be charged with a legacy.
1 Not only the testator's property, but that of an heir, or legatee, or
person already benefited by a trust, or any one else may be given by
a trust. Thus a legatee, or a person in whose favour the tes
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