Part 5
He was a celebrated local character of Czortków, Poland, and when he died in 1928, the newspapers of Germany and Poland repeated again the story of his life and of the strange vow that he never broke.
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“3,675 FEET AND 9 INCHES”
This is a Sabbath Day Journey, the longest distance a Jew may walk on his Sabbath Day as prescribed by the Talmud Berachoth.
Orthodox Hebrews observe this Rabbinical rule to the present day. It is the Hebrew “T’hum Sabbath” meaning the limit of Sabbath.
Exodus XVI. 29; Acts 1:12.
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THE SUN THAT RISES IN THE PACIFIC AND SETS IN THE ATLANTIC
If you would like to see the sun rise in the Pacific Ocean and set in the Atlantic Ocean you must go to Panama. Only there can you have this unusual viewpoint--and anyway, even though you never see the sun at all, you will see Panama, which, I assure you, is worth the trip anytime.
The way to Panama takes you across one of the most adventurous path-ways of the deep. A wonderful and picturesque procession of ships and men wended their devious ways among the islands and open waters of the blue Caribbean.
Santo Domingo was the birthplace of the Buccaneers. The island of Tortuga was the birthplace of the word “buccaneers.” The true meaning of the word is not worthy of the men who wore it. At that time on Tortuga the principle article of food was the smoke-dried flesh of wild pigs--a product peculiar to the neighboring islands and known by the Carib name of “bucan,” or what we call bacon.
As a result the inhabitants soon became known as “buccaneers”--in other words, “baconeers.”
Among these islands, and not so far away, is Porto Rico, which is an American possession; and a little farther on is another of our islands--St. Thomas, where bay rum comes from. Near there is an island most famed of all, yet nobody knows it. It is the little cay called “The Dead Man’s Chest.” Of course, you know it:--
“_Fifteen men on a Dead Man’s Chest-- Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!_”
But that was a long time ago--before prohibition.
Criss-crossing these limpid waters careened the “low, rakish craft” of the blood-thirsty free-booters--Morgan, Lolonais, Brasiliano, Portugues and Red Legs--and Captain Kidd who, by the way, was not a pirate at all but suffered the rightful penalty of one, while the murderous Morgan received the order of knighthood.
These wolves of the water hid in land-locked coves and preyed upon passing ships and Caribbean cities. They were not all low, rakish craft either. Morgan at one time commanded a fleet of thirty-seven ships--all mounted with guns--and with two thousand fighting fiends exclusive of the sailors. A tough egg in a hard-boiled world.
But all are gone.
All that remains is the chests of buried treasure which any one may find if he looks long enough. Many years ago William Phipps Salem, one-time governor of Massachusetts, found nearly two millions of dollars on Puerto Plata, which had been pirate property.
ONLY PIRATES NOW ARE AT HOME
The islands about and the lazy sea are now content to bask in the warm tropical sun and dream of the past.
The only pirates we have nowadays are in our own country--working as chauffeurs and hat-check boys.
But if you wish to see the sun rise in the Pacific and set in the Atlantic I suggest that you visit the Century Club in Panama. This club offers you an ideal view and a view of ideals, as it is situated exactly on the dividing line between two nations--the United States and the Republic of Panama. The Canal Zone is a strip of land five miles wide on each side of the Canal and running across the Republic of Panama. The Canal Zone is American territory and, of course, under the influence of Volstead. Panama, on the contrary, is under the influence of Bacchus.
The Century Club, which is situated as I have said, on a line between the two extremes, is divided on the question of prohibition also. The front door, which is in the Canal Zone--or United States territory, is dry; and the back door, which is in the Republic of Panama, is wet. Choose the entrance dearest to you--and walk, don’t run!
But I really started out to tell you about the unusual rising and setting of the sun. In order to understand why the sun rises in the Pacific and sets in the Atlantic at Panama it is necessary to know the geography of the Canal. As you will note from the map, the Canal does not run east and west but from northwest to southeast; and the Pacific entrance to the Canal--Balboa, is farther east than the Atlantic entrance--Cristobal.
And as you sit on the veranda in the cool of the day--sipping your glass of this or that, you see toward the west a blood-red sun drop precipitately behind the verdant Cordillera--into the Atlantic Ocean! And if you should sit there long enough--until the gentle hand of dawn draws back the warm velvety curtains of the tropical night--you will see the glowing face of the sun rise suddenly up in the east--out of the Pacific Ocean!
WHAT GOD HATH JOINED TOGETHER
The construction of the Canal is the greatest modern engineering achievement of mankind, but it was an old idea. Modern man is so full of the thoughts of his own achievements that he is inclined to forget that there is nothing really new under the sun.
Plans were made over 400 years ago for a sea level canal across the Isthmus of Darien. At that time Spain was by far the wealthiest and most powerful country on earth, and Indian labor was available by the millions for the cost of feeding them. The canal would have doubtless become a fact four centuries ago had not the Archbishop of Madrid advised King Phillip II. that:
“What God hath joined together, let no man tear asunder.”
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The two cities at the Atlantic entrance of the Canal, Cristobal and Colon, are the true names of Columbus. He never signed his name any other way than “Cristobal Colon.”
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BOOTLEGGING HUMAN HEADS
This sketch was drawn from a human head that I bought for a little less than a hundred dollars from a bootlegger of human heads in Panama City. The head itself is now about the size of a baseball and the hair is 19 inches long.
A few years ago this head was an animated thing of normal size with a pleasant smile and sparkling eyes that sat atop the shoulders of a Jivaro warrior in the tropical forests of Peru. This happy warrior was careless enough to lose his life--and also his head which his conqueror cut off and bore proudly home where he proceeded to shrink it down to its present size.
Since head-hunting and head-selling is against the law, this shrinking violet disposed of his handiwork to a bootlegger who smuggled the grisly thing into the City of Panama where I was able to buy it.
The taking and shrinking of human heads is an ancient rite with the Jivaros, and one which has not vanished with modern times. It has, rather, been stimulated by the demand of tourists for specimens of the head-hunter’s skill as souvenirs and all the laws against the practice that have been passed by the South American Republics are of no avail.
While there are traders to pay a price, and tourists to buy, the bootlegging of human heads will probably continue just as the bootlegging of hooch will continue in our own land.
The method of reducing and shrinking the heads remained a secret for many years and it is comparatively recently that anyone has witnessed the actual process. Friends of mine in Quito told me of a German scientist who ventured into the unexplored Pongo de Seriche--the land of the Jivaros--in hopes of learning their secret, and six months later a shrunken and mummified head with a red beard and light hair was offered for sale in the city.
The method used differs somewhat from tribe to tribe, but they generally proceed as follows.
As soon as a Jivaro has killed an enemy, he hacks off the head as close to the body as possible, and carries it away to a place of safety where he goes through an appropriate ceremony, and slits the scalp from the crown downward to the nape of the neck. Through this opening he flays out the skull, removing the flesh and skin of the face and scalp as carefully as possible. Throwing away the skull, he stretches the skin over a handle made of wood and then thrusts it for a time into a vessel of hot water which causes it to contract a little. Next a ring fashioned from a vine is sewed in the opening at the neck to hold it open after which hot stones are dropped inside. Magic rites are intermingled with each new process as the shrinking is begun by filling the head with hot sand and keeping it constantly in motion in order that it may act on all parts of the head uniformly. As the sand cools off, it is reheated and placed back in the head which is scraped each time with a headman’s knife to remove the burnt tissues. Gradually, as the head dries and grows smaller, the Indian constantly works the features with his hands, pinching and moulding the face so that it will retain its natural appearance--and even its natural expression when reduced several times in size.
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The Jivaros sometimes reduce and mummify the entire human body--but it does not seem to be commonly done. I have seen three. There are two in the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation of New York, and the other was shown to me by Señor Juan Krateil, of Lima, who owns a doll-like travesty of Kurruba, a “Heroe Peruano,” a quarter the size of the living man.
One of the two dequantitated figures in the New York Museum is a white man--a Spanish officer. This unfortunate old “conquistador” was searching for “El Hombre Dorado,” the golden man, when he was captured by the Jivaros who reduced him from a living man of five feet, ten inches in height to a shrunken mummy thirty-one inches tall.
“~Be Fruitful, and Multiply, and Replenish the Earth~”
_Gen. 1, 28._
Large families have always attracted particular interest among all peoples. In many lands the parents of prodigious progeny are rewarded by the state. Nations decimated by severe wars have used compulsory methods of marriage to gain children. The Orient is dotted with ribbon-bedecked shrines where childless wives pray for conception. There are savage tribes still existing who indulge in phallic worship.
Napoleon, when asked what France needed most, replied: “mothers.” And a baby’s crib once stood inside the door of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris.
Roosevelt emphasized parenthood and especially honored the parents of large families. President Coolidge also receives with marked distinction the large family groups that call on him.
The largest family to call at the White House was that of Mr. and Mrs. Harrison and their 37 children. This healthy brood of young Americans seems very small, however, when compared with the multinominal households of the warmer and freer lands, where wives are plentiful and can be had for the keeping.
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MULAI ISMAIL THE FATHER OF 888 CHILDREN
Mulai Ismail, the culminating glory of the Sharifian Emperors, is the prize “daddy” of all time. He was a real father of his country if there ever was one. Mulai ruled Morocco for fifty-seven years with his capital at Tafilat. He had many wives as is the royal and Mohammedan custom of Morocco, and when he died in 1727, the stalwart old patriarch left living 548 boys and 340 girls.
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Rameses II, the famous Pharaoh, was the father of 162 children--111 boys and 51 girls.
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Rama V, or King Chulalongkorn of Siam, who died in 1910 had 3,000 wives and 370 children--134 sons and 236 daughters.
THE NINE-YEAR-OLD MOTHER
Following is a true translation of the French Protocol as given by Dr. Cabanes in his book “Le Sixième Sens”:
“After the sensation which the news of a nine-year-old child, seven months pregnant, caused in Paris and at the Royal Court, the personal Surgeon-Obstetrician to Madame la Dauphine (the French Crown Princess) consulted with the Masters of the Medical Faculty and then decided to take into his house, Rue Mazarin, one Magdelaine-Charlotte-Jacquette-Renaud, daughter of Louis Renaud and Magdelaine Laflèche, who on the 30th day of June, 1756, at 3.30 in the morning, was happily delivered of a male child through an incision made in her left side, and survived, thanks to the particular mercy of Providence. The newlyborn is well and in every respect like the child of a normal mother. He was baptized in the Holy Faith at the Parish of St. André-des-Arcs and received the name of Jean-Louis. A pension of 1500 francs per annum has been assigned to the mother, payable during her lifetime, and she will be placed in a Convent after her recovery.
“The unfortunate Garçon Marchand, who has abused the innocence and weakness of this young child died on June 9th, or he would have been amenable to the severity of the law.
“The permission to reprint and to publish is given. Paris, July 4th, 1756, Berrier, Minister of Police and Royal Notary.”
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THE EIGHT-YEAR-OLD MOTHER
Clementine Aimée Pernon, of Puis Clos, France, 8 years old, gave birth to a perfectly developed child on June 3rd, 1866. _Annales de Gipsicologie, page 729, by Dr. Robert Gache._
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THE NINETY-YEAR-OLD MOTHER
In the “Chronique Publique dans la Revue Retrospective sous le Règne de Louis XV” (1742-1743) there appears an account of La Belle Paule Fieschi, of Rue de la Perle, Paris, who became a mother at the age of ninety. The child, a boy, was born on December 1, 1742.
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Jean Baptiste Tavernier, the celebrated traveler of the 17th century, tells in his book “Travels in India,” of seeing a Bhutan woman in northern India who had borne a child at the age of 82.
THE GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GRANDFATHER!
Ah-Kwei, of Kansu, China, saw his descendants down to the tenth generation. He was presented to the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of his son! Ah-Kwei lived in the Golden Age of Happiness. And when the Emperor of China was searching for the happiest man in his Empire, the Kansu patriarch was brought before him.
Ah-Kwei had 130 living great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandchildren in 1790.
_Ref.: “A China Jubilee,” by Robt. K. Douglas._
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THE OLDEST PARENTS IN THE WORLD
Margaret Krasiowna, of the village of Konin, Poland, died in 1763, aged 108. The following extraordinary circumstances are stated by Eaton as connected with the life of this woman:
“At the age of 94 she married her third husband, Kasper Raycol, age 105, of the village of Czywuszyn. During the 14 years they lived together she bore him 2 boys and a girl.
“The three children from their very birth, bore evident marks of the old age of their parents--their hair being grey, and a vacuity appearing in their gums, like that which is occasioned by the loss of teeth, though they never had any. They had not strength enough, even as they grew up, to chew solid food, but lived on bread and vegetables. They were of the proper size for their age, but their backs were bent, their complexions sallow, with all the other external symptoms of decrepitude.”
“Though most of these particulars,” adds Eaton, “may appear fabulous, they are certified by the parish registers. The village of Czywuszyn is in the district of Stenck in the palatinate of Sandomierz.”
Kasper Raycol, the father, died soon after, aged 119.
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THE GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GRANDMOTHER!
Speaking of descendants let me quote a verse on the tombstone of the famous Lady of the Dalburg Family who saw her descendants to the sixth generation. She was a great-great-great-great-grandmother.
“The Mother to her daughter spake: ‘Daughter,’ said she, ‘Arise! Thy daughter to her daughter take, Whose daughter’s daughter cries.’”
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THREE CHILDREN IN THREE CENTURIES
Pierre Defournel, of Barjac Vivarais, was the father of three children each born in a different century! The first boy was born in 1699, the second son was born in 1738, and the third was born in 1801. Each child was a boy, and each was born of a different wife. Defournel married his third wife when he was 120 years old and she was only 19. He died in 1809 at the robust old age of 129. The “Magasin Pittoresque,” May 1877, has a reprint of the original birth certificates of the three children.
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THE MOTHER OF 69 CHILDREN
Mrs. Bernard Scheinberg died at the age of 56 after giving birth to 69 children. This remarkable mother lived near the German border of Austria and passed away about 20 years ago.
Not one was a single birth. Mrs. Scheinberg had quadruplets 4 times, triplets 7 times, and twins 16 times.
Mr. Bernard Scheinberg is still alive and married again, and what is more, he has had 18 children by his second wife who is also still alive. Scheinberg is hale and hearty and 77 years old and has 67 children living around him. He was the father of 87 sons and daughters.
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The wife of Matthew Bauer, a farmer living near Nagykikinda, Jugoslavia, has given birth to a child each year for the last 28 years. All the children are alive and healthy. Twelve are married and 16 are still under the paternal roof.
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BUSINESS FOR THE PIED PIPER
In the quaint old town of Hameln, famous for the legend of the Pied Piper who enticed away all the children, there is an old house bearing a tablet telling of one Anna Roemer who made a lot of trouble for him.
It records that:
ANNA ROEMER GAVE BIRTH HERE TO 7 CHILDREN 2 BOYS AND 5 GIRLS ON JANUARY 9, 1600
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The largest family on record was that of Lukas Tchaffen, of Arlberg, Germany, (1612-1679) who left 1,091 direct descendants when he died. Herr Tchaffen had 5 children, 87 grandchildren, 446 great-grandchildren, 553 great-great-grandchildren.
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The family of Thomas B. Parker of New York City who died at the age of ninety leaving a family of 658 relatives, is noteworthy. Mrs. Margaret Sanger, the birth-control advocate, cites the huge family of descendants of Jukes, who had 1,200. Among them, according to Mrs. Sanger, were 130 paupers, 50 prostitutes, 60 thieves, 130 felons, and 7 murderers. _Nize babies!_
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THE PROGRESSIVE MOTHER
Madame de Maldemeure (Maldemeusre) gave birth to one child the first year, twins the second year, triplets the third year, quadruplets the fourth year, quintuplets the fifth year, and the sixth year the good woman bore six children. A total of 21 children in 6 years. She died as a result of her last confinement.
Madame de Maldemeure was the wife of Pierre-Roger, Squire of Maldemeure, a little village in the parish of Seaux near Chambelay, France. The first of their 21 children, Sieur de Maldemeure, afterwards became a notorious swashbuckler, courtier, and henchman of King Henry IV.
Dr. Ambroise Paré, the Father of Modern Surgery, is the authority for the above statements. He was the obstetrician at the birth of the sextuplets having been called into service by no less a personage than King Henry II, who had become interested in Mme. de Maldemeure’s ever-increasing family.
_Ref.: “Des Monstres,” by Ambroise Paré, volume XXV of his “Oeuvres,” chapter 5, and “Maldemeure,” by Jean Cassaque._
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YOU CAN’T BEAT THE DUTCH
Here is a translation of an inscription to be found in an abbey near The Hague, in Holland:
MARGARET, DAUGHTER OF THE ILLUSTRIOUS LORD FLORENT, COUNT OF HOLLAND, AND OF MATHILDE DAUGHTER OF HENRI, DUKE OF BRABANT, SISTER OF WILLIAM, KING OF GERMANY, BEING FORTY-TWO YEARS OF AGE, WAS DELIVERED ON THE FRIDAY BEFORE EASTER, AT 9 OF THE CLOCK IN THE MORNING, IN THE YEAR 1276,
OF
THREE HUNDRED AND SIXTY-FIVE BABES MALE AND FEMALE
WHICH (IN THE PRESENCE OF SEVERAL GREAT LORDS AND GENTLEMEN) WERE ARRANGED IN FRONT OF THE FONT AND WERE ALL BAPTIZED BY A BISHOP, THE MALES BEING CHRISTENED THE SAME NAME, NAMELY, JEAN, AND THE FEMALES ELIZABETH.
ALL DIED SOON AFTER, AS DID THE MOTHER, AND ALL WERE BURIED IN THE SAME SEPULCHRE.
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THE LARGEST NUMBER OF CHILDREN A WOMAN EVER HAD
I have been asked to state the largest number of children a woman could give birth to or ever gave birth to. A similar question was asked of the Editor of the _Journal of the American Medical Association_, and we reprint here the answer:
“Boer, and later V. Valento, reported a case in which eleven labors yielded thirty-two children. The patient was one of quadruplets and the husband one of twins. Berger (Halban) reported a patient who in twenty-five years had thirty pregnancies yielding thirty-six children, of which twenty lived. There were four twins and one triplet birth. The patient herself was one of twins. Burdach reported a case of twenty-seven labors with forty-nine children, of which there were six twins, seven triplets and four quadruplets. In a case reported by Küster there were forty-four children; in the first marriage, of twenty-two years, thirty children; in the second marriage, of three years, fourteen children (triplets, quintuplets and sextuplets). Geissler reported the case of Dr. Mary Austin, who in thirty-three years had forty-four children (thirteen twins and six triplets). She was an active War Nurse and had time to acquire a medical degree, too! A sister had twenty-six children and another sister had forty-one children. In Italian literature a case is reported of a woman who had thirty-three pregnancies with fifty-three children, and a forty-year-old woman who had forty-two children. A Brazilian woman is said to have had forty-four children, all singles, and her one daughter had nineteen and another eighteen children.”
These seem to be authenticated cases but as the Editor remarks, even these seemingly authentic cases are doubtful, for it is hard to count sheep without a sheep-counter. The human memory is notoriously treacherous in such matters.
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There are about 40,000 direct descendants of Confucius (551-478 B.C.) living in China at the present time.
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Gorgias, of Epirus, was born in a coffin in which his mother lay dead for two hours.
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Babou, Count of Abensberg et de Roye, had 32 sons serving in the army of Henry II of Germany at the same time.
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Stephen Pó̈ździoch was the father of 7 children--each one born in a different country.
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Marie Therese, Empress of Austria, was the mother of 16 children, of whom 2 became emperors and 3 became queens.
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Niels Paulsen, of Upsala, Sweden, died in 1907 at the age of 160 and left two sons—one 9 years old and the other 103 years of age.
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Bishop Heinrich of Luttich, Belgium (1281) was the father of 61 children.
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Madame Jacqueline Montgaste, of Paris, is the mother of 17 children by 14 different husbands.
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Hieronymus, of Rome, married 21 women--his twenty-first wife had had 20 husbands before him.
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King Alphonse of Spain was born a king. He received the oath of fidelity at the age of one month.
AN INDIAN JUGGLER’S REMARKABLE FEAT
The following account of a Hindoo who actually lifted a basket of snakes with his eyeballs was written by a young English army officer stationed in Deolai in the Bombay Presidency. He supplemented his letter with several small snapshots of the feat which was unquestionably an authentic performance.
“On my way out to India I heard of many strange and almost unbelievable tricks and feats which the native jugglers were alleged to be able to perform. Needless to say I took every possible opportunity of watching them at work, and saw many things which I could neither understand nor explain.