In accordance with the opinions of able physiologists, fat ought to constitute one-twentieth of the entire weight of the body in man (in the female about one-third more than in the male). It consists of a multitude of minute cells, frequently forming large masses held together by a very delicate membrane, the areolar tissue, which serves as a reservoir, and prevents the fat (which is fluid during life) from floating. When once fat begins to make its appearance in more than ordinary amount, there is no reason why this augmentation should naturally cease at any given point. This corpulence continues to increase until some disease, often occasioned by the condition itself, terminates this frightful increase of size. Cases of obesity are rarely met with in mountainous countries, and those having a great elevation above the level of the sea, where the atmosphere is dry; whilst they are frequent in valleys and plains at the level of the sea, having a moist atmosphere. Men are less subject to obesity than women. The areolar tissue which contains the fat is firmer in the male than in the female, and is not so readily distended by the accumulation of adipose matter. Corpulence is usually developed after the body has acquired its full growth, but childhood is not exempt. Not long ago, a child of four years old was exhibited at Paris, which weighed one hundred and four pounds. Dr. Coe, an English physician, makes mention of a man named Edward Bright, who weighed one hundred and four pounds at ten years of age; at twenty, three hundred and fifty-six pounds; and thirteen months before his death, five hundred and eighty-four pounds. Another person, a native of Lincolnshire, weighed five hundred and eighty-three pounds, and was ten feet in circumference: he died in his twenty-ninth year. In another instance a man weighed six hundred and nine pounds: his coat, when buttoned, could contain seven medium-sized persons. A case is recorded of a man who weighed six hundred and forty-nine pounds, and measured four feet three inches across the shoulders. In the "Javannah News," for June, 1853, the following case is communicated by a medical writer: "A young man, who lived about eighteen miles from Batavia, was remarkable for his great size. When twenty-two years of age, he weighed five hundred and sixty-five pounds. He continued to increase to over six hundred pounds. He lived upon his plantation in easy circumstances. Four weeks since, his weight began to increase at the rate of a pound and a half, and subsequently two pounds a day. He died one day last week, suddenly, while sitting in his arm-chair. Three days before his death, he weighed six hundred and forty-three pounds." Dupuytren has recorded the case of one Mary Frances Clay, of whom a plaster cast is preserved in the Museum of the Ecole de Médecine, at Paris. This woman, a native of Vieille Eglise, was of humble parents. Her husband travelled as a pedler from town to town.