"A study of this subject is impeded by the tendency of almost everyone to generalize from individual examples within his own observation. This is almost sure to be misleading, because no one's acquaintance is so large that it embraces factors enough to base a theory on. People say that life is longer than it used to be, because Palmerston rode to hounds at 82, and Peter Cooper and the Emperor William were intellectually vigorous at over 91. They forget that Marino Faliero was over 80 when he concocted his plot, and that the blind Dodge Dandolo was 84 when he took Constantinople. Every age has produced a few long-lived men, and here and there a centenarian." "The question of importance is not whether this age is yielding more centenarians than former ages, but whether, on the average, the age of man is longer than it was, and if so, how much longer? The grounds for an increased longevity--better doctors and more of them, better drainage, more wholesome food, wiser habits, and better facilities for securing change of air--justify the belief that life is lengthening, to what degree it is hard to say. M. Flourens, who had made a life study of the subject, said that every man ought to live to be a hundred, if he took care of himself." "In a number of the _Popular Science Monthly_ is an article by Clement Milton Hammond on the prolongation of human life that is interesting both in the way of being readable and as based on returns as to an unusually large number of persons above eighty years of age. The facts were obtained by sending out 5,000 blanks to be filled. They were sent through New England only and were intended to cover personal history and hereditary influence. Over 3,500 of the blanks were filled out and returned. They show that less than 5 per cent remained unmarried through life, the unmarried women being three times as numerous as the unmarried men. The average number of children was five. Five out of six of the old people had light complexions, blue or gray eyes, and abundant brown hair. The men were generally tall and ranged in weight from 100 to 160 pounds, with a few of 200 pounds, and the women of medium size, weighing from 100 to 120 pounds, with some exceptional cases up to 180 pounds. The men were generally bony and muscular, and the women the opposite. At the time of record the hair was generally thick, the teeth poor or entirely gone, the skin only slightly wrinkled. Generally their habits of eating and sleeping have been conspicuously regular. They have as a rule adhered to one occupation through life, and of the 1,000 men 461 were farmers. Few have used alcoholic drink stronger than cider. A large majority of the men used tobacco. The average age of the parents and grandparents of the persons reported on was about sixty-five. The average time of sleep was about eight hours." Dr. Maurice advances some staunch ideas on old age:--