Royal Society. 4 51 



about sixty miles from Bankok, the capital of the kingdom. Wlien 

 the intelligence of their birth reached the ears of the King of Siam, 

 he gave orders that they should be destroyed, as portending evil to 

 his government J but he changed his intention, and suffered them to 

 live, on being assured that they were harmless, and would be capable 

 of supporting themselves by their own labour. About six years ago, 

 Mr. Robert Hunter, a British merchant resident at Siam, saw them for 

 the first time in a fishing-boat on the river, in the dusk of the evening, 

 and mistook them for some strange animal. It was only in the spring 

 of last year that permission could be obtained from the Siamese Go- 

 vernment to bring them to England. They were taken to Boston in the 

 United States, where they landed in August last, and six weeks after- 

 wards embarked for England, and arrived in London in November. 



They are both of the same height, namely, five feet two inches ; 

 and their united weight is ISOlbs. They have not the broad and flat 

 forehead so characteristic of the Chinese race j but they resemble the 

 lower class of the people of Canton in the colour of their skins and 

 the form of their features. Their bodies and limbs are well made. 

 The band of union is formed by the prolongation and junction of the 

 ensiform cartilages of each, which meet in the middle of the upper 

 part of the band, and form movable joints with each other, connected 

 by ligamentous structures. Underneath the cartilages there appear 

 to be large hernial sacs opening into each abdomen ; into which, on 

 coughing, portions of the intestine are propelled as far as the middle 

 of the band ; though, in ordinary circumstances, these herniae are not 

 apparent. The entire band is covered with common integument j and 

 when the boys face each other, its length at the apex is one inch and 

 three quarters, and at the lower edge not quite three inches. Its 

 breadth from above downwards is four inches, and its greatest thick- 

 ness nearly two inches. In the centre of the lower edge there is a 

 cicatrix of a single navel. It possesses little sensibility, and is of great 

 strength ; for upon a rope being fastened to it, the twins may be 

 pulled along without occasioning pain ; and when one of them is 

 lifted from the ground, the other will hang by the band alone, without 

 sensible inconvenience. For the space of about half an inch from the 

 medial line of the band, the sensibility of the skin appears to be com- 

 mon to both. The following experiment was tried upon them by Dr. 

 Roget. A silver tea-ripoon being placed on the tongue of one of the 

 twins, and a disk of zinc on the tongue of the other, the moment the 

 two metals were brought into contact, both the boys exclaimed " Hour, 

 sour." thus proving that the galvanic influence passed from the one to 

 the other through tlie connecting band. Another simple but clever 

 experiment (which we need not detail, as all philosophical inquiries arc 

 not fit for publication) proved that the sanguineous inter-communion 

 was not common to the two. 



Their strength and activity are very remarkable. They can throw 

 down with perfect ease a powerful man. Tliey run with great swift- 

 ness, bend their bodies in all directions, and in their sports often tum- 

 ble head over heels without the least difficulty or inconvenience. In 



3 M 2 all 



