g goes
into it?"

Schenckius[4] quotes from Paulus Lentulus the "Wonderful History of the
Fasting of Appolonia Schreira, a virgin in Berne." Lentulus states that
he was with this maid on three occasions, and that, by order of the
magistrate of Berne, she was taken to that city and a strict guard kept
upon her. All kinds of means were set in operation to detect imposture
if any existed, but none was discovered, and she was set at liberty as a
genuine case of ability to live without food. In the first year of her
fasting she scarcely slept, and in the second year never closed her eyes
in sleep; and so she continued for a long while after.

Schenckius also advances the case of Katharine Binder, of the
Palatinate, who was closely watched by a clergyman, a statesman, and two
doctors of medicine, without the detection of fraud on her part. She was
said to have taken nothing but air into her system for nine years and
more, as Lentulus reported on the authority of Fabricius. This
last-named physician told Lentulus of another case, that of a girl
fourteen years old, who certainly had taken neither food nor drink for
at least three years.

"But," says Dr. Hakewel,[5] "the strangest that I have met with of this
kind, is the history of Eve Fliegen, out of Dutch translated into
English, and printed at London, _anno_ 1611, who, being born at Meurs,
is said to have taken no kind of sustenance for the space of fourteen
years together; that is, from the year of her age, twenty-two to
thirty-six, and from the year of our Lord 1597 to 1611; and this we have
confirmed by the testimony of the magistrates of the town of Meurs, as
also by the minister who made trial of her in his house thirteen days
together by all the means he could devise, but could detect no
imposture." Over the picture of this maid, set in front of the Dutch
copy, stand these Latin verses:

"Meursae haec quam cernis decies ter, sexque peregit,
Annos, bis septem prorsus non viscitur annis
Nec potat, sic sola sedet, sic pallida vitam
Ducit, et exigui se oblectat floribus horti."

Thus rendered in the English copy:

"This maid of Meurs thirty and six years spent,
Fourteen of which she took no nourishment;
Thus pale and wan she sits sad and alone,
A garden's all she loves to look upon."

Franciscus Citesius,[6] physician to the King of France and to Cardinal
Richelieu, devotes a good deal of space and attention to the case of
Joan Ba