To his old friend and manager, Fitz-Greene Halleck, he left the somewhat ridiculous annuity of two hundred dollars, which Mr. William B. Astor voluntarily increased to fifteen hundred.  Nor was this the only instance in which the heir rectified the errors and supplied the omissions of the will.  He had the justice, to send a considerable sum to the brave old captain who saved for Mr. Astor the large property in China imperilled by the sudden death of an agent.  The minor bequests and legacies of Mr. Astor absorbed about two millions of his estate.  The rest of his property fell to his eldest son, under whose careful management it is supposed to have increased to an amount not less than forty millions.  This may, however, be an exaggeration.  Mr. William B. Astor minds his own business, and does not impart to others the secrets of his rent-roll.  The number of his houses in this city is said to be seven hundred and twenty.

The bequests of Mr. Astor for purposes of benevolence show good sense and good feeling.  The Astor Library fund of four hundred thousand dollars was the largest item.  Next in amount was fifty thousand dollars for the benefit of the poor of his native village in Germany.  “To the German Society of New York,” continued the will,

“I give thirty thousand dollars on condition of their investing it in bond and mortgage, and applying it for the purpose of keeping an office and giving advice and information without charge to all emigrants arriving here, and for the purpose of protecting them against imposition.”

To the Home for Aged Ladies he gave thirty thousand dollars, and to the Blind Asylum and the Half-Orphan Asylum each five thousand dollars.  To the German Reformed Congregation, “of which I am a member,” he left the moderate sum of two thousand dollars.  These objects were wisely chosen.  The sums left for them, also, were in many-cases of the amount most likely to be well employed.  Twenty-five thousand dollars he left to Columbia College, but unfortunately repented, and annulled the bequest in a codicil.

We need not enlarge on the success which has attended the bequest for the Astor Library,—­a bequest to which Mr. William B. Astor has added, in land, books, and money, about two hundred thousand dollars.  It is the ornament and boast of the city.  Nothing is wanting to its complete utility but an extension of the time of its being accessible to the public.  Such a library, in such a city as this, should be open at sunrise, and close at ten in the evening.  If but one studious youth should desire to avail himself of the morning hours before going to his daily work, the interests of that one would justify the directors in opening the treasures of the library at the rising of the sun.  In the evening, of course, the library would probably be attended by a greater number of readers than in all the hours of the day together.

The bequest to the village of Waldorf has resulted in the founding of an institution that appears to be doing a great deal of good in a quiet German manner.  The German biographer of Mr. Astor, from whom we have derived some particulars of his early life, expatiates upon the merits of this establishment, which, he informs us, is called the Astor House.