LONGEVITY.
Scope of the Present Article.--The limits of space in this work render impossible a scientific discussion upon the most interesting subject of longevity, and the reader is referred to some of the modern works devoted exclusively to this subject. In reviewing the examples of extreme age found in the human race it will be our object to lay before the reader the most remarkable instances of longevity that have been authentically recorded, to cite the source of the information, when possible to give explanatory details, and to report any relative points of value and interest. Throughout the article occasional facts will be given to show in what degree character, habit, and temperament influence longevity, and in what state of mind and body and under what circumstances man has obtained the highest age.
General Opinions.--There have been many learned authorities who invariably discredit all accounts of extraordinary age, and contend that there has never been an instance of a man living beyond the century mark whose age has been substantiated by satisfactory proof. Such extremists as Sir G. Cornewall Lewis and Thoms contend that since the Christian era no person of royal or noble line mentioned in history whose birth was authentically recorded at its occurrence has reached one hundred years. They have taken the worst station in life in which to find longevity as their field of observation. Longevity is always most common in the middle and lower classes, in which we cannot expect to find the records preserved with historical correctness.
The Testimony of Statistics.--Walford in his wonderful "Encyclopedia of Insurance" says that in England the "Royal Exchange" for a period of one hundred and thirty-five years had insured no life which survived ninety-six. The "London Assurance"for the same period had no clients who lived over ninety, and the "Equitable" had only one at ninety-six. In an English Tontine there was in 1693 a person who died at one hundred; and in Perth there lived a nominee at one hundred and twenty-two and another at one hundred and seven. On the other hand, a writer in the Strand Magazine points out that an insurance investigator some years ago gathered a list of 225 centenarians of almost every social rank and many nationalities, but the majority of them Britons or Russians.
In reviewing Walford's statistics we must remember that it has only been in recent years that the middle and lower classes of people have taken insurance on their lives. Formerly only the wealthy and those exposed to early demise were in the habit of insuring.
Dr. Ogle of the English Registrar-General's Department gives tables of expectancy that show that 82 males and 225 females out of 1,000,000 are alive at one hundred years. The figures are based on the death-rates of the years 1871-80.
The researches of Hardy in the thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries are said to indicate that three-score-and-ten was considered old age; yet many old tombstones and monuments contain inscriptions recording age far beyond this, and even the pages of ordinary biographies disprove the alleged results of Hardy's research.
In all statistical work of an individual type the histories of the lower classes are almost excluded; in the olden times only the lives and movements of the most prominent are thought worthy of record. The reliable parish register is too often monopolized by the gentry, inferior births not being thought worth recording.
Many eminent scientists say that the natural term of the life of an animal is five times the period needed for its development.
Taking twenty-one as the time of maturity in man, the natural term of human life would be one hundred and five. Sir Richard Owen fixes it at one hundred and three and a few months.
Censuses of Centenarians.--Dr. Farr, the celebrated English Registrar-General, is credited with saying that out of every 1,000,000 people in England only 223 live to be one hundred years old, ****** an average of one to 4484. French says that during a period of ten years, from 1881 to 1890, in Massachusetts, there were 203 deaths of persons past the age of one hundred, ****** an average, with a population of 394,484, of one in 1928. Of French's centenarians 165 were between one hundred and one hundred and five; 35 were between one hundred and five and one hundred and ten; five were between one hundred and ten and one hundred and fifteen; and one was one hundred and eighteen. Of the 203, 153 were females and 50 males. There are 508 people in Iowa who are more than ninety years of age. There are 21 who are more than one hundred years old. One person is one hundred and fifteen years old, two are one hundred and fourteen, and the remaining 18are from one hundred to one hundred and seven.
In the British Medical Journal for 1886 there is an account of a report of centenarians. Fifty-two cases were analyzed. One who doubts the possibility of a man reaching one hundred would find this report of interest.
The Paris correspondent to the London Telegraph is accredited with the following:--"A census of centenarians has been taken in France, and the results, which have been published, show that there are now alive in this country 213 persons who are over one hundred years old.