3. One ancient dame had no more doubt of the fact than the cause of it. Having apparently heard and believed a monstrous tradition of a multitudinous gestation extant in common "folklore." "It was," said she, with all gravity, "the effect of a wish," intended to spite the father; who, having had two children by his wife, and an interval of _nine years_ elapsing before the portentous pregnancy in question, did not desire, it seems, any further increase to his family. 4. The parents died, the daughter married, and the "story of her birth" was forgotten: until the publication of White's _Sheffield Directory_ in 1833, when, among other local memorabilia, the strange announcement of "ten children at birth," was reproduced on the contemporary authority of the _Leeds Mercury_. From that time Mrs. Platts has been more or less an object of curiosity. 5. The _Directory_ paragraph is as follows:-- "An instance of _extraordinary fecundity_ is recorded in the _Leeds Mercury_ of 1781, which says that _Ann_ [Sarah] _Birch_, of Sheffield, was, in that year, _delivered of ten children!!!_ We, in our time, have heard of Sheffield ladies having three children at birth; but we know no other case, but that of the aforesaid Mrs. Birch, which countenances the fructiferous fame which they have obtained in some circles." I have been unsuccessful in an effort to collate the foregoing with the original newspaper paragraph: but Mr. White, while he personally assured me of the veracity of the transcript, also pointed out to me an earlier version of the same fact from the same source in the _Annals of the Clothing Districts_, published about thirty years since. 6. In conformity with the suggestion (NOTES AND QUERIES, Vol. ii., p. 459), I have examined the Parish Register of Baptisms, but the entry is as curt and formal as possible, viz.:-- "Sarah, Dr. of Thos. and Sarah Birch, Cutler," under the date, Dec. 12.1781.