Daily Los Angeles herald., 1878-10-27
FACTS ABOUT METHUSELAH.
A Brief Biography Of that Venerable Pa
triarch.
[Clncinnati Saturday Night

lCinciAnati Saturday Night
What tremendous boyhood old
had! He died at the
rather advanced age of 9s9 years,
about 900 years more than mans
span OF life. At that rate, when he
was 200 years old he about equaled
An ordinary lad Of Is. He was 80
or 40 before his parents bought him
a rattle to play with, and didn't
have the measles and other infan-
tile diseases until he was over 100.
He was In no sort OF hurry about
these things, as he had so far to 60.
We imagine that he was rather
delicate child to begin with, as
most People are who live to great
age. We can imagine his moth.
sr's anxiety with regard to his del
icate constitution, telling Mrs.
Brown, across the way, on his
nineteenth birthday that she was
afraid she "never would be able to
raise that child" Generations of
men lived and passed away while
he was going around in petticoats,
and he was almost a centenarian be-
fore he got into his first boots. His
father used to lick him when he
was $50 for robbing neighbours 8
watermelon patch.
Young Methuselah was probably
in the vicinity of a hundred years
old when he was first sent to school.
We can imagine him sitting on the
low bench learning his a-b-abs
among the great-great grandchil-
dren of people who began life when
he did. He was mischievous, OF
course-all boys are, no matter
what their age 1--WE experience a
mild friskiness ourself, OCCASION
ally), and had to be punished for
1t.
William Henry Methuselah,
stand upp says the teacher, catch
ing him in the very act of placing
a bent pin in seat where school
mate was about to sit down.
"What do you mean by such con.
duct as this?n
Young Methuselah begins to
sniff1e and wipe his eyes with the
corner of his jacket.
"One would think" continues
the teacher sternly, "that you
wasn't over seventy-five or eighty
years old by the way you behave.
Instead OF that, you have already
celebrated your first centennial
almost young man, in fact. You
ought to be ashamed of yourself"
Whenever a circus comes ia
town, with "children half-price''
on its bills, young Methuselah must
have experienced difficulty in max
ing the ticket.seller understand
that he was entitled to go in on q
haIf-price ticket, particularly aftel
he got along towards his two-hun-
dredth year. But he probably did
it. Boys are enterprising and per.
sistent where circus is concerned
And we will bet that Methuselah
in his youthful days, could accu'
mulate as much old iron as the
next boy, and lay it by for the
coming show.
When this youngster got into his
teens-say 200 to 800 years old-ht
probably did as other gentlemen o.
tender age do, when around will
the girls. 1t must have been a lit
tie embarrassing to him, aftel
beauing q young lady about spell
taking her te concerts, balls
etc., to discover that she was q
great-great-great-great-great-grand
child of some old friend OF his
fathers, but these things were in
evitable under the peculiar and ex.
ceptional character of the circum.
stances. They could hardly be
otherwise. There is no record tc
show that any woman lived in his
time to an age that would begin to
compare with his. And If there
had, the world would never have
known it. AT least, not from her
She wouldn't have acknowledged
to anything over forty, had she
lived to twice the age of Methusa
leh. That is the kind of hair-pin
a woman Is.
Applying the proportion of
twenty-One to seventy to Methusa.
leh's years, we find that he was a
minor until he was two hundred
and seventy years old. If the la WIS
regarding minors were enforced in
his day, young Mathuselah must
have been run out Of billlard-rooms
and shut out from bars for over two
centuries. And what a sensation
must have been created when he
stepped up to deposit his first vote.
or course he voted for all the
Presidents, from Washington
(whom he remembers shaking
hands with down. All old men
did that. And when he got to be
along in years-say nine hundred
or such a matter-he could sit and
tell the boys about the hard winter
of 1872. and the panic Of '37, and the
flood Of '39, aud the hard.cider
campaign of 40, aud all that sort
OF thing.