Chap. V. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 159 



days of Henry Darnley, there lived in my neighbourhood, in the 

 north of Scotland, a gentleman of the name of Straiton, not dead 

 above fifty years, who, as I was informed by. a gentleman who lived 

 a year in the houfe with him, was feven feet in height, and as broad 

 as any two ordinary men, fuch as we fee now. His fon was a 

 big man, but nothing like his father ; and his grandfon, who is yet 

 living, is a man of the ordinary ftature of this generation. 



There is a record of the decreaie of the human ftature in mo- 

 dern times, that is, or, at leaft, was to be feen within thefe few years. 

 An account of it I had fome years ago, in a French letter, from a 

 learned gentleman in France, with whom I correfponded. He fays 

 that, fome time about the year 1 740, the Journalifts of Trevoux, ha- 

 ving been informed of bones of extraordinary fize in the burial-place 

 of the monaftery of the Grande Chartreux, fituated near to Grenoble^ 

 in that branch of the Alps which runs into Daupliiny, defired that 

 one of their number would correfpond with fome of the principal 

 men in that religious houfe, and inform himfelf what truth there 

 was in the report. Accordingly he did fo ; and the account he got 

 was to this efFed : That the Religious of this order, fmce their 

 foundation in the end of the 12th century by St Bruno, have al- 

 ways buried their dead in a large vault, cut out of the rock, where 

 the bodies are interred in different cells or nitches, each by itfelf, 

 with the name of the perfon marked upon the cell, the year of God, 

 the month and day when he was interred : So that here is a 

 record, fuch as, I believe, is not to be found any where elfe in the 

 world, of the fize of the human body, for near 600 years. If, in 

 fo long a time, there had been no vifible decrcafe of the fize, I 

 fhould have thought it a very ftrong argument in favour of the hy- 

 pothefis, that there has been no alteration in the fize of men fmcc 



the 



