51 6 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1741. 



Concerning an Extraordinary Skeleton, and of a Man who gave Suck to a Child. 

 By Robert Lord Bishop of Cork. N°46l, p. 810. 



The bishop of Cork here gives an account of a skeleton of a man, whose 

 bones, during his life-time, were almost all grown into one entire bone, so that 

 now his flesh is taken from them, he is one entire skeleton. The only bones 

 he could move before his death, were the wrist of his right hand, and the bones 

 of his knees, so that he could move his legs a little ; and, when set upright, 

 could in about a quarter of an hour get a foot forward. 



For many years before his death, he could not alter his posture in the least. 

 He was valued by his master on account of his honesty. The only use he was 

 capable of being put to, was that of watching the workmen ; for when he was 

 once fixed in his station, it was impossible for him to desert it. 



At about 18 years of age he began to be unwieldy, and so continued growing 

 more stiff, till he lost all use of his limbs, and died in the 6 1st year of his age. 

 The posture into which he fixed at last, was somewhat like that of the Venus of 

 Medicis, only that his right hand was the lowest, and the left hand did not rise 

 higher than the elbow of the right. He was originally deformed, his left 

 shoulder rising higher than his right; the vertebrae of his back were exceedingly 

 bent inwards towards the lower part, with an inclination towards the left hip. 

 The OS sacrum was so bent outwards, that you had no sight of it all. His left 

 knee did not come down so low as the right by 3 or 4 inches. There was hardly 

 one bone in his body in the figure it ought naturally to be, except the bones of 

 his legs, which were not much distorted. 



He was one entire bone from the top of his head to his knees. 



His head seemed regular, and the sutures pretty distinct, though more 

 united than in common skulls. His jaw-bones seemed entirely fixed, and 

 grown together, as were also the teeth in the hind part of the jaw. His fore- 

 teeth were very irregular, which left a vacancy for him to suck in his food at. 

 Out of the back of his head there grew a bone, which shot down towards his 

 back, and passed by the vertebrae of the neck at about an inch distance : this 

 bone united to the vertebrae of the back, and the scapula of the left shoulder, 

 from whence it disengaged itself again, and continued distinct, till it divided 

 into 2 towards the small of the back, and fixed itself into both the hip-bones 

 behind. The vertebrae of the neck and back were one continued bone. 



In the fleshy part of his thighs and buttocks Nature seemed to have sported 

 herself, in sending out various ramifications of bones from his coxendix and 

 thiigh-bones, not unlike the shoots of white coral, but infinitely more irregu- 

 lar ; some behind, and some before ; some in clumps and clusters, and others 



