169 
from Dr. Balgny, giving an account of the preservation of two 
human bodies in peat for fifty-nine years. "On January 
14tli, 1675, a farmer and his maidservant were crossing the 
peat moss above Hope, near Castleton, Derbyshire, when they 
were overtaken by a great fall of snow, and both perished; 
their bodies were not found till May 3rd in the same year, 
and, being then in a very offensive state, the coroner ordered 
them to be buried on the spot in the peat. The man's name 
was Carter. There they lay undisturbed twenty-eight years 
and nine months, when the curiosity of some countrymen in- 
duced them to open their graves ; the bodies appeared quite 
fresh, the skin was fair and of its natural colour, and the flesh as 
soft as that of persons newly dead. They were afterwards 
frequently exposed as curiosities, until the year, 1716, when 
they were buried in Hope church, at the expense of Mr. 
Barber, of Rotherham, the man's grandson. At that period 
Dr. Bourne, of Chesterfield, who examined the bodies, says : 
* The man was perfect, his beard was strong, the hair of his 
head was short, and his skin hard and of a tanned leather 
colour, like the liquor in which he was lying. The body of 
the woman was more injured, having been more frequently 
exposed; the hair was like that of a living person.' The 
Rev. Mr. Wormald, the minister of Hope, who was present 
when they were removed for interment, says : ^ The man's 
legs, which had never before been uncovered, were quite 
fair when the stockings were drawn off, and the joints played 
freely without the least stiffness.'"* In June, 1749, the body 
of a woman was found six feet deep in a peat moor, in the 
Isle of Axholm, in Lincolnshire, the antique sandals on 
whose feet afforded evidence of her having been buried there 
for ages, yet her hair, nails, and skin are described as having 
shown hardly any marks of decay, f On May 1st, 1783, a 
* Bakeii-ell, 451, 
+ Sigele, vol. iii., p. 183. 
