144 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1757. 



Extract of a Letter from JViUiam Burnet, Esq. F. R. S. eldest Son of Dr. Gilbert 

 Burnety Lord Bishop of Salisbury, to Doctor Hans Sloane, dated Leyden. 

 May 9, 1708, N, S.* 



In this letter Mr. Burnet states that he had seen, and attentively examined 

 this union of twin sisters at the Hague, They were Hungarians : the urinary 

 passage was between the 2 foremost thighs. The situation of this, as well as of 

 the anus, was the same to outward appearance as naturally, with this difference, 

 that they were between 2 different bodies here, whereas in the course of nature 

 they are between the 2 parts of the same body. It seems probable that their 

 parts were distinct ; but that the most remote labia of each were outwardly vi- 

 sible, and the 2 contiguous ones within. There seemed to be no cheat in the 

 thing ; and the skin where they were joined was perfectly smooth, without any 

 scar. They were then about 6 years old. They spoke French and High German. 

 They were very full of action, and talked one more than the other. When one 

 stooped to take up any thing, she carried the other quite from the ground ; and 

 that one of them often did, being stronger as well as more lively than the 

 other. They had not their feeling common any where but in the place of their 

 conj unction. -|- 



This letter was read to the r. s. on the 12th of May 1708. J 

 Soon after the date of Mr. Burnet's letter, the twin sisters were brought to 

 England and publicly shown in London, as appears from the following ms. note 

 in a copy of the print bound up by the writer with Fortunius Licetus de Mon- 

 stris,|| edit. Amstelod, l665, 4to. in the possession of T. Wilbraham, m. d. 

 p.R.s. " Londini 14 Junii 1708, has vidi gemellas (plus annis 6 natas) quarum 

 forma et vivacitas elegantior et vegetior quam pictura et descriptio." 



Another account of them by an eye-witness in London is in a ms. vol. among 

 those of Sir Hans Sloane, Bart, in the British Museum, intitled, a short History 

 of human Prodigies and monstrous Births, of Dwarfs, Sleepers, Giants, strong 

 Men, Hermaphrodites, numerous Births, and extreme old Age, &c. The name 

 of the writer was James Paris du Plessis. In p. 39, under the title Two Sisters 

 conjoined, he gives a drawing of them, and the following description : " These 

 2 monstrous girls were born at Szony in Hungary in the year 1701. They were 

 born conjoined together at the small of the back. I asked the father and mother, 

 if they could not be separated one from the other } but they answered, no ; 



* Original letters to Sir Hans Sloane, Bart. vol. a — b. in the British Museum. — Orig. 

 1 f. ThiH letter was accompanied with a print of these conjoined twin sisters. 



X Journal, vol- xi. p. i43. — Orig. 



H In this treatise, L. 2. p. 80 is the following passage: in pago Rorbachio non procul Heydelberga, 

 Parasietiam relatu, gemini utriusque sexus obversis tergoribus annexis orti sunt. — Orig. 



