This is a contest of the will of Mary Gaines Jackson, who died January 10, 1963. The will in question was executed on November 8, 1962. The appellants objected to its probate on the ground that the instrument was not signed and witnessed in the manner required by law and on the additional ground that the testatrix lacked testamentary capacity. The probate court sustained the will. Here the appellants attack the will upon the same grounds that were asserted in the court below.
We consider first the validity of the testatrix’s sig*843nature. When the will was executed the testatrix, Mrs. Jackson, was about a hundred years old. For the preceding seventeen or eighteen years she had been totally blind. Before her affliction Mrs. Jackson had been able to read and write, but the contestants proved by several 'witnesses that after she lost her sight she made no attempt to write and customarily signed her name by mark. Inasmuch as the will bears the testatrix’s purported signature, the appellants insist that it could not have been genuine.
This argument fails to take into account the proponents’ proof. The typewritten will was prepared by Florence D. Sands, who was present at its execution. Mrs. Sands testified that after reading the will aloud she assisted the testatrix in signing it. The pen was in the testatrix’s hand, but Mrs. Sands helped her write her name. The signature, as it appears upon a photostatic copy of the will in the record, is not illegible, but the letters are so badly formed as to confirm Mrs. Sands’ testimony.
Upon this point the ease is governed by Vines v. Clingfost, 21 Ark. 309 (1860). There the testator was so feeble that the draftsman of the will guided .the r testator’s hand as he signed the instrument. We upheld the will, saying: “If one having testamentary capacity, is unable from palsy or other cause, to steady his hand so as to make to his will the signature required by law, another person may hold his hand and aid him in so doing; and it is not necessary to prove any express request from the testator for such assistance. The act is his own, with the assistance of another, and not the act of another under authority from him. ’ ’ In the case at bar the testimony convinces us that the testatrix intended tq sign the will and merely accepted aid in carrying out her purpose.
We come next to the formalities attending the execution of the will. Mrs. Jackson was in bed whé’h she signed the will. The two attesting witnesses, Fréd L. *844Harris and Marie Ellison, then came separately into the room and signed the will beneath a typical attestation clause. The appellants seem to contend, though this is not clear, that the two witnesses were required to sign the will in the presence of each other.
There has never been any requirement in Arkansas that the two witnesses sign in the presence of each other, though in construing our original statute we said that such a course might be most prudent. Rogers v. Diamond, 13 Ark. 474 (1853). In fact, very few states have such a requirement, and where it exists it is clearly expressed in the statute. Atkinson, Wills, 295 (1937).
The Probate Code made no change in our law in this respect. We quote the pertinent section of the Code, Ark. Stat. Ann. § 60-403 (Supp. 1965):
The execution of a will, other than holographic, must be by the signature of the testator and of at least two witnesses as follows:
a. TESTATOR. The testator shall declare to the attesting witnesses that the instrument is his will and either
(1) Himself sign; or
.(2) Acknowledge his signature already made; or
(3) Sign by mark, his name being written near it and witnessed by a person who writes his own name as witness to the signature; or
(4) At his discretion and in his presence have someone else sign his name for him, (the person so signing shall write his own name and state that he signed the testator’s name at the request of the testator); and
(5) In any of the above cases the signature must be at the end of the instrument and the act must be *845done in the presence of two or more attesting witnesses.
b. WITNESSES. The attesting witnesses must sign at the request and in the presence of the testator.
It will be seen that the section contains two subdivisions. Subsection a is headed “Testator” and deals only with the manner in which the testator is to execute the will. The requirement that ‘ ‘ the act must be done in the presence of two or more witnesses” discloses no legislative intention to require that the witnesses sign in each other’s presence.
Subsection b is headed “Witnesses” and requires merely that the witnesses sign at the request and in the presence of the testator. Had the legislature intended to change the law, clearly the modification would have been inserted in subsection b. Our conclusion is reinforced by Official Probate Form 4, “Proof of Will,” 214 Ark. xix. That form, prepared by the draftsmen of the Code and promulgated by this court, contains no recitation that the witnesses signed in the presence of each other.
Only one of the attesting witnesses, Harris, testified, and he did not explicitly state that Mrs. Jackson acknowledged her signature and requested him to sign as a witness. He did say, however, that he was told that the instrument was a will and that he was asked to sign it. Mrs. Sands, a disinterested witness who was present throughout the execution process, testified clearly that the testatrix knew what she was doing and that the two witnesses came in and signed the will in her presence. The testimony is sufficient, under our decisions, to support an inference from the circumstances that all the statutory provisions were substantially complied with. Hanel v. Springle, 237 Ark. 356, 372 S. W. 2d 822 (1963); Leister v. Chitwood, 216 Ark. 418, 225 S. W. 2d 936 (1950).
We need not discuss the remaining issue, that of *846testamentary capacity, in detail. The contestants’ proof was directed principally to the testatrix’s asserted inability to write her name. The one medical witness testified that Mrs. Jackson suffered from senility, that her mind would come and go. He did not attempt to say unequivocally that the testatrix lacked testamentary capacity on the day the will was executed. The lay testimony preponderates in favor of the view that Mrs. Jackson had sufficient mental ability to meet the familiar tests of testamentary capacity. Finally, there is nothing of an unusual nature in the will itself. There is a devise of real property to the testatrix’s only child, a bequest of personal property to her brother and sister, and a devise of real property to her niece, Sally Walls, who had lived in Mrs. Jackson’s home and taken care of her for more than a year. Upon the record as a whole we are convinced that the probate court correctly upheld the will.
Affirmed.
Byrd, J., concurs.
Harris, C. J., dissents.