CHARLES BALGUY, M.D. 15 
where viewing them some time after it was found they were entirely 
consumed.* They had lain about a yard deep in the soil or moist 
moss, but without any water in the place. When their stockings 
were drawn off, the man’s legs, which had never been uncovered 
before, were quite fair; the flesh, when pressed with the finger, 
pitted a little, and the joints played freely and without the least 
stiffness ; the other parts were much decayed. What was left of 
their clothes (for people had cut away the greater part as a 
curiosity) was firm and good. The woman had on a piece of new 
serge, which seemed never the worse.” 
He contributed to the ‘‘ Medical Essays” in 1736. Dr. Pegge 
says that he married at Peterborough. As Pegge was an accurate 
genealogist, and must have been well acquainted with Balguy both 
at school and college, I cannot think that he was mistaken. Yet 
there is no mention of wife or children in his will or on his 
monument. Nor have I succeeded in finding any clue to his 
marriage in the parish registers of Peterborough. He seems to 
have been on terms of intimate friendship with the Misses Eleanor 
and Sarah Hake, a name well known in Peterborough a century 
ago. To the former he left half his property, and it seems 
probable that he was related to these ladies by marriage. 
The house which he occupied at Peterborough is that which 
“had in its front in plaster two boars’ headst with a bend or 
dagger in them, which dagger was found in the Isle of Ely, and 
lent to Dr. Stukely, who promised to return it, but gave it to the 
Duke of Montague.’’ He was Secretary to the Peterborough 
Literary Society,§ and a member of the parent Spalding Society. 
* See more on this subject in Cox’s Churches of Derbyshire, vol. I1., p. 266, 
et seg, also p. 237. 
+ Allibone’s Dictionary of Authors. 
+ His family crest was a bear passant, proper, collared and chained, or. 
§ The founder of the Peterborough Society was Dr. Timothy Neve. Writing 
from that city in 1741, Dr. Neve says :—‘‘ Since I came to settle in this place I 
have instituted a society of gentlemen, most of University education, who meet 
every Wednesday evening, whereof the Dean is president, and myself secretary. 
We are near twenty regular members, and about a hundred honorary. . . . 
We have a pretty large collection of curiosities, natural and artificial, such as 
shells, minerals, petrifactions, prints, medals, etc., etc., which now and then 
amuse us a little, and give us the appearance of meeting to do something else 
than smoke a pipe or drink a bottle.” —Nichol’s Literary Anecdotes, vol. VI. 
