Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1894-10-07

aged 13s, read without spectacles and
| PLAYED cribbage until few day before
| his death, while on Christmas day,
three years before, when be was l35,
he walked nine miles 20 dine with one
of his great grandchildren. A poverty
stricken Englishman, who died In 1893,
when he was 112, earned livelihood
in very novel way. As old age came
on, being no longer able to work or
beg, he made a contract with barber
thirty years before his death, by which
he received a penny loaf day for a
mortgage on his hair, OF which he had
an unusual crop. The barber got rich
making wigs and they both lived COM
fortSbly by this scheme, the one oslng
the producer and the other the manu-
| facturer.
A Norwegian named Surlngton is said
to have died 10 1897 at the age OF 159,
| leaving a wiia aud several children, the
eldest Of which was ninety-four years
older than the youngest. A Welchman
who departed this life in the eyentful
year 1875, at q tremendous age, had
patriotic record which in thab year only
! beftted au American. He was the father
of thirty children by his frst wife, ten
! by his second and four by his third.
His youngest child was eighty-one years
younger than his eldest and when he
died eight hundred OF his direct decen-
ants attended his funeral.
Mrs. Watkins, of GlamorEanshire,
| England, visited London at the age OF
1lO, TO see a celebrated actress playing
in the theatres there at that time. Dur
ing this visit she is known to have
walked up tie many flights OF steps
leading TO the whispering gallery Of
ST. Paul's Cathedral This old lady
lived on potatoes, exclusively, through
out her waning days. But one OF the
most tempting records Of vitality was
| that earned by John Tice, an English
man, who existed during the protector
ate of Cromwell, dying In TIA, at the
age Of 1875. When he was about eighty
years old tree fell on top OF him, break
ing both Of his legs and Gripping him
! for llfe A few years later he took q
heavy cold and lost his hearing. After
| he became centennarian, while Sit
ting In his room by an open FIREPLACE,
he took fit and fell into the blaze,
being rescued by relative who happen
| ed 10 enter the room accidentally. But
after all these casualties the old fellow
lived on, almost for a half century, to
| die only OF broken heart. He was
| a great lover Of Lord LytIeton, and only
survived that mobiles death few days.
Although the English scientists In
the medical profession seem always TO
have spent more time ransacking bis
tory for its curiosities than did the
Yankee doctor, we can brag OF record
quite as marvellous a. all this. DIR.
Worcester, an old New Eng land author
ity gives, in hts pamphlet on longevity,
the names and addresses Of one hundred
and thirty Americans, who died within
the thirteen years following 1905, all OF
whom lived over 40 years. Among
these one was $50, one l43, one l42, one
1877 and another 134, while others range
almost in consecutive numbers down 10
ITO. 1t is not unlikely that each year
may now bring forth some eXtraordin-
arY cases, quite equal to these. But un-
fortunately our doctors are too practical
for historians. Then, too, the consul
statistics do not include any individual
cases of longevity, there being but one
general class to include ages over nine
ty-fVe. Among the interesting cases
described in connection with the Wor-
cester table, is that of Flora Thompson,
a colored woman of Harba Island, Pa,
said to have died in 1908, at the age OF
$50. Sooman Nabit, an old hunter OF
Laurens county, s. c., died in 1920
aged 143, having joined hunting par
" before his death, when ne killed
deer A man named Francisco, who
lived near Whitehall, New York, died
in 1920 aged 1874, having fought in
Queen Anne's wars in England under
the Duke of Marlborough, and also in
our Revolution, during which he was
carried a prisoner TO Quebec. lie was
once 1 hard drinking man, but always
aostained from animal food. won
DER" negro belonging to the Booker
family, of Prince Edward county, Va,
died in 1919 at the age Of 126, having
done constant abOrng work up to the
day OF his death.
English works on longevity are also
scattered with cases Of American vitali-
" and long life. man named Hoff,
born in Norway, died in New York In
1865 aged 1913. John de la Sonnet died
in Virginia 1865, when he was $50, hav-
ing been an inveterate smoker all OF his
life. A man named Auge died in Mary
land in 1867, aged 1874, his wife having
presented him with son when he was
1913 and when she was eighty. John
| Weeks, OF New London, Connecticut,
died when he was ia, eight years after
be had married mis- tenth wife, who was
but sixteen on becoming his bride. His
hair fell out once, after it had turned
white, but he afterward raised a second
crop which was raven black. An Irish
man named Screby, who died in Lon
douderry, \. g., aged ITO, was known
to have walked from Londonderry
to Portsmouth. distance OF
thirty-fve miles, when be was
past one hundred. A baker named
Metlin, who died in Portsmouth in 1877
at the age of lis, was In the habit OF
walking from that town to Boston
whenever he purchased -four. He
always made this trip in one day be-
tween sunrise and sunset, and vas
known positively TO have gone over the
road, when be was so years old, in the
same time. Dr. Worcester says that
in those days it took stage coach the
greater part of two days to make the
same Journey, but that on one occasion
a man who had . good horse and light
vehicle, thereby travelling between the
two places in one day, was overtaken
by Metlin every time he stopped for a
half hour to rest his horse, and having
started from Portsmouth al tne same
time. they arrived in Boston in the same