Royal Society. 461 
vaftly exceed thefe limits, in both thcfe refpciSls, as m the in- 
llances of 7ho. ^Parr and Henry Jenkins both of England^ and 
the Countefs of 'JJeJmnd and Mrs. Ecclefton both of Ireland 
who fully compleated double the ufual term of life • fo we have 
no reafon to queilion the accounts given of others, that have been 
found in Itature double the common ftandard of man 3 nay, both 
thefe properties, longevity, and high ftature, do io naturally re- 
fult each from their proper caufes, that they are often obferved to 
become hereditary, and run in whole families 3 whence the 
Greeks had their Macrobii, and the Romans their Celfi-^ and in 
^alefiine of old they had their Anakims, or Ions of the giants • 
lb that human gigantic bodies are no way inconfiftent with the 
courfe of nature • and indeed, we have fome clear tellimonies 
given us by authors of unquellionable credit and veracity, that 
there a(^uall)^ have been men in the world, and it is likely *there 
Hill are, of lb large a bulk, and lb high a flature of body, as 
properly to deferve the name of giants : Edmund Mallone, when 
he itood with his ihoes ofF, meafured full 7 foot 7 inches in 
height ^ Walter \Parfons, porter to King James I. was much of 
the fame ftature : Isbrand jDiemerbroeck tells us, he faw at 
Utrecht a man 8 f foot high, born at Schoonhoven in Holland 
of parents of an ordinary itature- Jo.GoropiusSecanus faw a 
youth almoft 9 foot high, a man near 10 foot, and a woman that 
was quite 10 foot in height^ "Pliny the naturalilt fpeaks of 
feverai men m his age much of the fame height, or fomethins 
caller 3 and it is not improbable, that where both the foil and 
climate concur, and are naturally difpofed to produce plants 
fruits and leveral kinds of animals, of a much larger bulk than 
any our country affcjjrds^ liich as the oilriches and cunters amonj* 
birds 5 the J a rgeft crocodiles, the moule deer, the elephant, the 
rhinoceros., the hippopotamus, ^c. among quadrupeds 5 in 'thofe 
parts of the world, where fuch vaft animals are met with, it 
is not unlikely that men may fometimes be found of a much 
greater iize than any here among us : Andreas Tbevet, in his 
delcription of America, tells us, he was ihewn by a Spanip 
merchant, the Ikull and bones of an American g\d.Y\t, 11 foot 
and 5 inches high j the bones of the legs meafured full 3 foot 4 
inches in length, and the ikull was 5 foot i inch about- which 
circumference the Dr. obierves, is exadly proportionable' to the 
length of the legs, and if we make an allowance for the hair and 
fkin that covered the iWl when he was alive, it falls very little 
ihort of the dimenlions gf the giant's head before let down. 
From 
