your life didn’t combine themselves through some pro-cess

A curious epitaph is to be seen at Conway, Carnarvonshire--

"Here lieth the body of Nicholas Hookes, of Conway, gentleman, who was one-and-fortieth child of his father, William Hookes, Esq., by Alice, his wife, and the father of 27 children. He died 20th of March, 1637."

On November 21, 1768, Mrs. Shury, the wife of a cooper, in Vine Street, Westminster, was delivered of 2 boys, making 26 by the same husband. She had previously been confined with twins during the year.

It would be the task of a mathematician to figure the possibilities of paternity in a man of extra long life who had married several prolific women during his prolonged period of virility. A man by the name of Pearsons of Lexton, Nottingham, at the time of the report had been married 4 times. By his first 3 wives he had 39 children and by his last 14, making a total of 53. He was 6 feet tall and lived to his ninety-sixth year. We have already mentioned the two Russian cases in which the paternity was 72 and 87 children respectively, and in "Notes and Queries," June 21, 1856, there is an account of David Wilson of Madison, Ind., who had died a few years previously at the age of one hundred and seven. He had been 5 times married and was the father of 47 children, 35 of whom were living at the time of his death.

On a tomb in Ely, Cambridgeshire, there is an inscription saying that Richard Worster, buried there, died on May 11, 1856, the tomb being in memory of his 22 sons and 5 daughters.

Artaxerxes was supposed to have had 106 children; Conrad, Duke of Moscow, 80; and in the polygamous countries the number seems incredible. Herotinus was said to have had 600; and Jonston also quotes instances of 225 and even of 650 in the Eastern countries.

Recently there have been published accounts of the alleged experiments of Luigi Erba, an Italian gentleman of Perugia, whose results have been announced. About forty years of age and being quite wealthy, this bizarre philanthropist visited various quarters of the world, securing women of different races; having secured a number sufficient for his purposes, he retired with them to Polynesia, where he is accredited with maintaining a unique establishment with his household of females. In 1896, just seven years after the experiment commenced, the reports say he is the father of 370 children.

The following is a report from Raleigh, N.C., on July 28, 1893, to the New York Evening Post:--