M. de Solaville

“ CAN man reach and pass the age of a hundred years? is a question concerning which physiologists have different opinions. Buffon was the first one in France to raise the question of the extreme limit of human life. In his opinion, man, becoming adult at sixteen, ought to live to six times that age, or to ninety-six years. Having been called upon to account for the phenomenal ages attributed by the Bible to the patriarchs, he risked the following as an explanation: "Before the flood, the earth was less solid, less compact, than it is now. ”

“ As to whether the proportion of great longevities is increasing or diminishing, we have information only for France. During the fourteen years, from 1823 to 1837, the mean annual number of persons dying centenarians was 152, or one for 217,105 inhabitants; during the eight years, from 1852 to 1860, the mean was 111 in a population that had increased twenty per cent. But, although the great ages seem to have diminished, the mean length of life has very sensibly increased, and this is much better. ”

“ It is questionable whether these old persons may not have had some interest in claiming such great ages.
In modern times, we have for France documents relatively worthy of faith only from the beginning of the eighteenth century. Except in a small number of cases, where the ages have been authenticated by extracts from baptismal registers, these ages have no other guarantee of exactitude than the declarations of the interested parties and contemporaries. ”

“ According to a table we have calculated for fifteen countries of Europe, more women than men attain an extreme old age, and the difference increases with the age. The greatest number of persons over sixty years of age is found in France, but not the greatest number of centenarians. Calculating upon the given age at death, we have found the percentage of those among the deceased who were ninety years old and more to be, in Great Britain, 9·73 ”

“ This junction takes place in horses at five years, and the horse does not live beyond twenty-five years; with the ox, at four years, and it does not live over twenty years; with the cat at eighteen months, and that animal rarely lives over ten years. With man, it is effected at twenty years, and he only exceptionally lives beyond one hundred years. The same physiologist admits, however, that human life may be exceptionally prolonged under certain conditions of comfort, sobriety, freedom from care, regularity of habits, and observance of the rules of hygiene ”

“ Documents which we have before us—necessarily very incomplete—attribute to France, during the eighteenth century, a few more than a hundred centenarians. The majority of these were men, but women appear to have reached the most advanced ages. Agriculturists figure largely in the number, while industrial workers and inhabitants of cities are few among them. ”

“ The ancient Greek writers, especially Lucian, have left biographical notices concerning several centenarians of their country, and mention philosophers, moralists, poets, and artisans who reached and even passed one hundred years, among them the following: Solon, Thales, Pittacus, Epimedes, four of the seven wise men of Greece, lived more than a hundred years according to Lucian, who fixed the date of their death at about b. c. 600. Epimenides, poet and historian, according to Pliny, died at one hundred and fifty-four ”

“ A much more serious fact, and one that may be more reasonably admitted, is that of hereditary longevities, of which there are numerous examples. Most of these centenarians appear to have been temperate, only two instances of drunkards being known among them. Many of them were indefatigable walkers, traversing every day considerable distances to go to their work ”

“ Thompson, however ("Curiosities of Longevity") , nothing decisive is involved in the extreme rarity of centenarians in the annals of insurance companies, for the highest ages are found in the lower classes of society, and notably among agriculturists, who do not insure their lives. ”

“ M. Kennoux, Mayor of Plermeux-Gontier for fifty-three years, died in the same year at a hundred years and eight months. François Pelpel, a distiller of Paris, announced in the newspapers in 1878 that he had reached his one hundredth year, and was enjoying good health. Louis Etienne Mirvault, a former diplomat, who had served in the American war with Lafayette and Rochambeau, died at Ransay in the same year, aged a hundred and two years and six months. The celebrated physicist Becquerel was more than a hundred years old when he died. ”