Scientific littcUigciue. — Zoology. 197 



beiiiniiin<£ of last March, and was two months and a half old. 

 This drawing, and the news of the event, were communicated 

 to him by Professor Rolando and M. Jules Arthaud, a French 

 physician. The individual represented is a gii'l with two heads. 

 The lower parts alone are common to the two individuals : the 

 rest is separated, and presents the conformation proper to the 

 normal state. The priest, seeing in this creature two distinct 

 individuals, baptized each of them, separately : one received the 

 name of Ritta, the other that of Christina. They were born at 

 Sassari in Sardinia, in the beginning of March 1829- Their 

 common size is that of a child at the full term. Ritta appeared 

 to be suffering. The father has the intention of carrying them 

 to Milan, whence he is to go to Geneva. There have been ex- 

 amples of such monsters living to a pretty advanced age. In ' 

 the reigTi of James VI. of Scotland, and at his court, there lived 

 a man who was double from the navel upwards. The king had 

 him carefully brought up. He made rapid progress in music. 

 The two heads acquired several languages : they disputed to- 

 gether, and tlie two upper halves sometimes even beat each 

 other. In general, however, they lived on good terms. When 

 the lower part of the body was tickled or pricked, the two indi- 

 viduals felt at the same time. When, on the contrary, one of 

 the upper individuals was irritated, it alone experienced the ef- 

 fects. This monster lived to the age of twenty-eight. One of 

 the bodies died several days before the other. — (Rerum Scot. 

 Hist. auct. G. Buchanan). In 1 723, M. Martinez observed at 

 Madrid a bicephalous man, who was shewn there for money. 

 Sigebert also says that he saw a child double above and single 

 below. The one ate, the other did not. They often fought toge- 

 ther. One of them dying, the other scarcely survived four hours. 

 1 1 . Observations on a Htcman Monster belonging to a new ge- 

 nus. — M. GeofFroy St Hilaire, in May 1829, read to the French 

 Academy of Sciences a memoir on a new production of the human 

 species, struck with monstrosity in the fourth month of intra-ute- 

 rine life, and on the concurrence of circumstances which, pro- 

 duced the monstrosity, by disturbing a foraiation, which, until 

 that period, was regular. On the 26th April last, was born, in 

 the Rue du Fauxbourg St Martin, of a woman aged 24 years, 

 who had no children previously, a child of regular period, and 



