300 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1787' 



which were all immediately baptised, and all died at the same time next morning. 

 — In September, 1757, a poor woman, of Burton Ferry, Glamorganshire, was 

 delivered of 3 boys and 1 girl. 



Dr. Hamilton before- mentioned writes, that not many years ago a woman 

 was delivered of 4 children, at Pennyciiick, the seat Of Sir John Clark, Bart, 

 near Edinburgh, when she was advanced to the middle of her last month of 

 pregnancy, and that some of these children lived 2 or 3 years. He further says, 

 that, 5 years ago, he attended a woman at Edinburgh, who, in the 7th month 

 of her pregnancy, after a journey of 30 miles, was suddenly delivered of 4 

 children, all perfect and well grown for the time, of which 1 was born dead, and 

 3 alive ; but those 3 died next day. He further adds, that these are the only 

 cases of quadruplets, or any larger number, he had ever heard of, as born in 

 Scotland, in his memory. 



Though cases similar to the present of 5 children born at once, are still much 

 more uncommon ; and though Haller's assertion of their not happening above 

 once in a million of births, may be reckoned a very moderate calculation, yet 

 we are not altogether without such instances in this country. From the Gent. 

 Mag. we learn, that on the 5th of Oct. 173^? a woman at a milk-cellar, in the 

 Strand, was delivered of 3 boys and 2 girls at 1 birth ; and that in March, 1739, 

 at Wells, in Somersetshire, a woman was delivered of 4 sons and 1 daughter, 

 all alive, all christened, and all then seemingly likely to live. — In the Commer- 

 cium Literarium Norimbergense for the year 1731, we have 2 such cases; one 

 happening in Upper Saxony, the other near Prague, in Bohemia ; in each of 

 which 5 children were born and christened, all of whom were arrived to that 

 equal degree of maturity, which rendered it probable, they were all conceived 

 about the same time. — I learned from 2 foreign Professors, when in London 

 last winter, that they had each heard of a case of 5 children born near Paris, 

 and near Ghent in Flanders ; but the particulars not being sent as promised, I 

 presume they may have been misinformed. 



When we advance further we get into the region of tradition and improba- 

 bility ; and it would ill become me to trouble a Society, whose professed object 

 is truth and science, with the numerous and wonderful relations which many 

 grave and learned authors have recorded as facts they themselves believed ; yet I 

 still think we have no authority to reject absolutely every relation of this kind, 

 when Ambrose Parey, a very honest, though credulous man, tells, that in his 

 time, in the parish of Sceaux, near Chambellay between Sarte and Maine, the 

 mother of the then living lord of the noble house of Maldemeure had, in the 

 first year of her marriage, brought forth twins, in the 2d triplets, in the 3d 

 four, in the 4th five, and in the 5 th year 6 children at 1 birth, of which labour 



