592 ANATOMICAL EXAMINATION OF PARR. 



And then for one hitherto used to live on food unvaried in 

 kind, and very simple in its nature, to be set at a table loaded 

 with variety of viands, and tempted not only to eat more 

 than wont, but to partake of strong drink, it must needs fall 

 out that the functions of all the natural organs would become 

 deranged. Whence the stomach at length failing, and the 

 excretions long retained, the work of concoction proceeding 

 languidly, the liver getting loaded, the blood stagnating in the 

 veins, the spirits frozen, the heart, the source of life, oppressed, 

 the lungs infarcted, and made impervious to the ambient air, 

 the general habit rendered more compact, so that it could no 

 longer exhale or perspire no wonder that the soul, little con- 

 tent with such a prison, took its flight. 



The brain was healthy, very firm and hard to the touch ; 

 hence, shortly before his death, although he had been blind 

 for twenty years, he heard extremely well, understood all that 

 was said to him, answered immediately to questions, and had 

 perfect apprehension of any matter in hand; he was also 

 accustomed to walk about, slightly supported between two per- 

 sons. His memory, however, was greatly impaired, so that he 

 scarcely recollected anything of what had happened to him 

 when he was a young man, nothing of public incidents, or of 

 the kings or nobles who had made a figure, or of the wars 

 or troubles of his earlier life, or of the manners of society, 

 or of the prices of things in a word, of any of the ordinary 

 incidents which men are wont to retain in their memories. 

 He only recollected the events of the last few years. Never- 

 theless, he was accustomed, even in his hundred and thirtieth 

 year, to engage lustily in every kind of agricultural labour, 

 whereby he earned his bread, and he had even then the 

 strength required to thrash the corn. 



