Читать книгу Dealings with the Dead (Vol. 1&2) - Lucius M. Sargent - Страница 50

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In 1823, and in the month of May, something, in my line, caused me to visit the first ex-President Adams, at the old mansion in Quincy. By some persons, he was accounted a cold man; and his son, John Quincy, even a colder man: yet neither was cold, unless in the sense, in which Mount Hecla is cold—belted in everlasting ice, though liable, occasionally, to violent eruptions of a fiery character.

As I was taking my leave, being about to remove into a distant State, my daughter, between five and six years old, stepped timidly towards Mr. Adams, and placing her little hand upon his, and looking upon his venerable features, said to him—“Sir, you are so old, and I am going away so far, that I do not think I shall ever see you again—will you let me kiss you before I go?” His brow was suddenly overcast—the spirit became gently solemnized—“Certainly, my child” said he, “if you desire to kiss a very old man, whom it is quite likely you will never see again.”—He bowed his aged form, and the child, rising on tiptoe, impressed a kiss upon his brow. I would give a great deal more than I can afford, for a fair sketch of that old man’s face, as he resumed his position—I see it now, with the eye of a Swedenborgian. His features were slightly flushed, but not discomposed at all; tears filled his eyes; and, if one word must suffice to express all that I saw, that word is benevolence—that same benevolence, which taught him, on the day of his death, July 4, 1826, when asked if he knew what day it was, to exclaim—“Yes, it is the glorious Fourth of July—God bless it—God bless you all.”

At the time of the little occurrence, which I have related, Mr. Adams was eighty-eight years old. I ventured to say, that I wished we could give him the years of Methuselah—to which he replied, with a faint smile—“My friend, you could not wish me a greater curse.”—As we wax older and grayer, this expression, which, in the common phrase, is Greek to the young and uninitiated, becomes sufficiently translated into every man’s vernacular. Mr. Adams was born October 19, 1735, and had therefore attained his ninety-first year, when he died.

Nothing like the highest ancient standard of longevity is attained, in modern times. Nine hundred, sixty, and nine years, is certainly a long life-time. When baby Lamech was born, his father was a young fellow of one hundred and eighty-seven. Weary work it must have been, waiting so long, for one’s inheritance!

The records of modern longevity will appear, nevertheless, somewhat surprising, to those, who have given but little attention to the subject. The celebrated Albert De Haller, and there can be no higher authority, enumerated eleven hundred and eleven cases of individuals, who had lived from 100 to 169. His classification is as follows:—

1000	from	100 to 110
60	"	110 to 120
29	"	120 to 130
15	"	130 to 140
6	"	140 to 150
1	of	169.

The oldest was Henry Jenkins, of Yorkshire, who died in 1670. Thomas Parr, of Wilmington, in Shropshire, died in 1635, aged 152. He was a poor yeoman, and married his first wife, when he was in his 88th year, or, as some say, his 80th, and had two children. He was brought to Court, by the Earl of Arundel, in the reign of Charles I., and died, as it was supposed, in consequence of change of diet. His body was examined by Dr. Harvey, who thought he might have lived much longer, had he adhered to his simple habits. Being rudely asked, before the King, what more he had done, in his long life, than other old men, he replied—“At the age of 105, I did penance in Alderbury Church, for an illegitimate child.” When he was 120, he married a second wife, by whom he had a child. Sharon Turner, in his Sacred History of the World, vol. iii. ch. 23, says, in a note, that Parr’s son (by the second wife, the issue by the first died early) lived to the age of 113—his grandson to that of 109—his great-grandson to that of 124; and two other grandsons, who died in 1761 and 1763, to that of 127.

Parr’s was a much longer life than Reuben’s, Judah’s, Issachar’s, Abner’s, Simeon’s, Dan’s, Zebulon’s, Levi’s, or Naphthali’s. Dr. Harvey’s account of the post mortem examination is extremely interesting. The quaint lines of Taylor, the water poet, as he was styled, I cannot omit:—

“Good wholesome labor was his exercise,

Down with the lamb, and with the lark would rise;

In mire and toiling sweat he spent the day,

And to his team he whistled time away:

The cock his night-clock, and till day was done,

His watch and chief sundial was the sun.

He was of old Pythagoras’ opinion,

That green cheese was most wholesome with an onion;

Coarse meslin bread, and for his daily swig,

Milk, buttermilk, and water, whey and whig.

Sometimes metheglin, and by fortune happy,

He sometimes sipp’d a cup of ale most nappy,

Cider or perry, when he did repair

T’a Whitsun ale, wake, wedding or a fair;

Or, when in Christmas time he was a guest

At his good landlord’s house, among the rest.

Else he had very little time to waste,

Or at the alehouse huff-cap ale to taste.

His physic was good butter, which the soil

Of Salop yields, more sweet than candy oil.

And garlic he esteemed, above the rate

Of Venice treacle or best Mithridate.

He entertained no gout, no ache he felt,

The air was good and temperate, where he dwelt;

While mavises and sweet-tongued nightingales

Did sing him roundelays and madrigals.

Thus, living within bounds of nature’s laws

Of his long, lasting life may be some cause.

From head to heel, his body had all over

A quickset, thickset, nat’ral, hairy cover.”

Isaac lived to the age of 180, or five years longer than his father Abraham. I now propose to enter one or more well-known old stagers, of modern times, who will beat Isaac, by five lengths. Mr. Easton, of Salisbury, England, a respectable bookseller, and quoted, as good authority by Turner, prepared a more extensive list than Haller, of persons, who had died aged from 100 to 185. His work was entitled Human Longevity—1600 of his cases occurred, within the British Isles, and 1687 between the years 1706 and 1799. He sets down three between 170 and 185, giving their names and other particulars.

Mr. Whitehurst’s tables contain several cases, not in Mr. Easton’s work, from 134 years to 148. Some twenty other cases are stated, by Turner, from 130 to 150. I refer, historically, to the case of Jonathan Hartop, not because of the very great age he attained, but for other reasons of interest: “1791.—Died, Jonathan Hartop, aged one hundred and thirty-eight, of the village of Aldborough, Yorkshire. He could read to the last, without spectacles, and play at cribbage, with the most perfect recollection. He remembered Charles II., and once travelled to London, with the facetious Killegrew. He ate but little; his only beverage was milk. He had been married five times. Mr. Hartop lent Milton fifty pounds, which the bard returned, with honor, though not without much difficulty. Mr. Hartop would have declined receiving it; but the pride of the poet was equal to his genius, and he sent the money with an angry letter, which was found, among the curious possessions of that venerable old man.”

On the 4th of July, 1846, I visited Dr. Ezra Green, at his residence, in Dover, N. H. He showed me a couple of letters, which he had received, a short time before, from Daniel Webster and Thomas H. Benton, congratulating him, on having completed his one hundredth year, on the 17th of the preceding June, the anniversary of the battle of Bunker’s Hill, and remarked, that those gentlemen had not regarded the difference, between the old style and the new. He told me, that in 1777, he had been a surgeon, in the Ranger, with John Paul Jones. Upon my taking out my glasses, to read a passage in a pamphlet, to which he called my attention, he told me he had never used spectacles, nor felt the need of any such assistance, in reading. Dr. Green died, in 1847.

He graduated, at Harvard, in 1765. At the time of his death, every other member of his own class, numbering fifty-four, was dead.

Previously to 1765, two thousand and seventy-five individuals are named, upon the catalogue. They were all dead at the time of his decease, though he died so recently, as 1847. Yet, from the year, when he graduated, to 1786, a period of twenty years, of seven hundred and seventy-three graduates, fifteen only appear, upon the catalogue of 1848, without the fatal star. One of the fifteen, Harrison Gray Otis, has recently died, leaving three survivors only, in his class of 1783, Asa Andrews, J. S. Boies, and Jonathan Ewins. Another of the fifteen has also recently died, being the oldest graduate, Judge Timothy Farrar, of the class of 1767. The oldest living graduate of Harvard is James Lovell, of the class of 1776.

I send my communication to the press, as speedily as possible, lest he also should be off, before I can publish.