“M. 4. Car. in Cur. Ward, _and afterwards_ P. 5. Car. B.R. _Thecar marries a lewd woman; but she doth not cohabit with him, and is suspected of incontinency with Duncomb: Thecar dies: Duncomb within three weeks after the death of Thecar, marries her: two hundred and eighty-one days and sixteen hours after his death she is delivered of a son. Here it was agreed, 1. If she had not married Duncomb, without question the issue should not be a bastard, but should be adjudged the son of Thecar. 2. No averment shall be received that Thecar did not cohabit with the wife. 3. Though it is possible, that the son might be begotten after the husband’s death, yet, being a question of fact, it was tried by a jury, and the son was found to be the issue of Thecar._” Lord Hale’s case of E. 2. appears very extraordinary, the time from 30 June from 7 E. 2. when the Earl of Gloucester died, to the _quindene_ of Hilary, or 29 Jan. 9 E. 2, when the livery to his sister was further postponed in parliament, being _within one day of a year and seven months_; which is a much later date for the delivery of a live child, than the most liberal in their calculations have hitherto assigned. However, on reading the printed copy of the original record, in the rolls of parliament lately published, we find Lord Hale’s note quite accurate. See Rot. Parl. v. 1. p. 353.—As to the case of R. 2. it confirms the doubt we have elsewhere stated of the opinion, that, if a widow marries again and has a child within nine months after the death of the first husband, the child may choose his father; and is an authority for deciding according to the proof of the woman’s condition when her first husband died. Ante fo. 8. a. note 7. Terms of the Law, first edit. tit. _Bastard_, and Cowel Inst. lib. 1. t. 9.—Lord Hale’s two other cases are reported in several books, Alsop and Stacey being in Cro. Jam. 541. Godb. 281. Palm. 9. 1 Ro. Abr. 356. and Thecar’s in Cro. Jam. 685. Winch. 71. Litt. Rep. 177.[179] II. _Note on Lord Coke’s Doctrine as to the latest time with Women for Parturition._ If our law was really as strict in point of time as is here represented by Lord Coke, it would not sufficiently conform to the course of nature. The physicians, it is true, generally call _nine_ months, each being of thirty days, the _usual_ period for a woman’s going with child. But then they allow, that, as a delivery may be accelerated by various accidental and other causes, so it is frequently protracted, not only for _ten days_ beyond the nine months, but to the end of the _tenth_ month, and sometimes for a considerably longer time. See Zach. Quæst. Medico-legal, lib. 1. tit. 2. Justice therefore requires, that, in the case of posthumous children, an excess of the usual time should not operate further, than by raising a proportional _presumption_ against the legitimacy.