SUPPOSED TO HAVE EEEN ONE HUNDRED AND SIX YEARS OLD. 153 



branches. The heart was very fat, its muscular tissue firm ; there 

 were blood-clots on its interior. There was splenization of the lung 

 and bronchitis (sic). In the other organs of the body there was 

 nothing worthy of note. Melis's parents had, like himself, attained 

 great ages. The post-mortem appearances put on record by Dr. 

 Berruti coincide in scarcely a single particular with those I have 

 noticed in John Pratt. Ossification of the cartilages is noted in 

 this case and in that of Dr. Holyoke ; in the cases given by Haller, 

 Dr. Keill, Harvey and myself they were not thus altered. That 

 the immoderate use of alcoholic drinks may lead to this change, 

 even in young subjects \ cannot be doubted ; still, as Dr. Holyoke 

 led a life of the greatest temperance, the ossification of his costal 

 cartilages must have been owing to some other cause. Old age 

 causes very opposite changes to take place in bone ; possibly it may 

 act upon cartilages in equally differing ways. 



The appearances noted in the case of John Pratt coincide with 

 those recorded in the case of Thomas Parr, in the following parti- 

 culars. In both, the stomach and intestine- walls were of normal 

 firmness and thickness ; in both, the spleen was very small ; in 

 both, the outer surface of the kidney was beset with serous cysts, 

 and that of the heart with fat, and in both the costal cartilages 

 retained their softness. In this last point, as well as in that of the 

 dilatation of the aorta, Haller's and Dr. Keill's cases resemble that 

 of John Pratt. Dr. KeilFs case affords a yet more perfect parallel 

 by the state of the right kidney, of the spleen, and of the pigment- 

 spotted lungs. In this last point, as in that of the condition of 

 the testes, Parr differed from Pratt. 



Dr. Holyoke has left us a graphic account of the sensation of 

 fluctuation within his head, which led him to suspect the existence 

 of what has been called hydrocephalus ex vacuo. The post-mortem 

 examination verified his diagnosis. In this point, as well as in that 

 of pigmentary deposit in the lungs, in those of abundant deposit of 

 fat round the heart, of bloodlessness of the scalp, of widened cere- 

 bral fissures, and of cysts upon the kidney's surface, the case I have 

 here recorded coincides with that of Dr. Holyoke. 



None of the appearances recorded in the post-mortem of John 

 Pratt are inconsistent with the claim he made to the age of 106 ; 

 the many points, indeed, in which they resemble the appearances 



1 Humphry ' On the Human Skeleton,' p. 58. 



