HOW TO LIVE TO BE 100

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 1211, 10 December 1919, Page 7

HOW TO LIVE TO BE 100

CENTENARIAN'S DRASTIC LIST OF " DONT'B." ADVICE WHICH WJLL NOT APPEAL TO MARRIED PEOPLE. The world's oMesb diplomatist, Senator Count Giuseppe Greppi, of Italy, who is still halo and -hearty at the age of 100. has giyei. to a, correspondent his rules for living a long life. They arc somewhat drastic, :and it is to bo' fct.red that many, on reading thrau, will prefer a. s'bort life and a merry ono. The Count's secret is very simple,".and. chiefly consist? of "don'ts."" Here they are:

DON'T many; DON'T live a imiily life; DON'T have children; DON'T cat or- think, -too much ; DON'T fall in love ; DON'T WORRY. i

All the big secret, he says, is in th» last don't! DON'T WORRY! A man or . woman who worries cannot live to be 100 : cannot enjoy those lessor emotions and normal pleasures of social life, which make .'.ifo itself flow, on like some calm, sunlit river. Bub to keep the big don't you must observe all the little ones. Marriage is a perpetual source of vorrv, living with one's family is another source. Children! Delightful creatures, to bo sure, but not to have of ono*s own. They are always either ill, or wanting education, toys, amusements, friends, clothes, busbands, wives, or the thousand and one things children want, and naturally ask their parents for. Food and drink, only in moderation. Love! The cause ofninetcntihs of the 'world's doubles. Coniu Greppi has lived) more than a century. lie pays calls, walks every day, and goc»s to the Senate in Rome whenever it .is sitting, makes- a speech when occasion demands, carries on platonic flirtations', dines o-tt every night except when he, has friends to dinner, eats the orditmrv fooii of an ordinary well-to-do society man, drinks his shifts of wine, lias his cup of black coffee, holds receptions, writes letters, goes home somewhere between midnight and I o'clock all by himself, and lives the life of a man of 65. His MINI) IS A STOREHOUSE OK MEMORIES of persons and events which he saw and knew, but have, become eJd history to us. Seventy-seven years ago lie entered the Austrian Diplomatic Service under Met-t-ernich. His diplomatic career ended 31 years ago, when ho left the post of Ambassador at St. Petersburg. He had been in diplomatic posts in London, Berlin, Athens, Constantinople, Stuttgart, Munich, and Madrid, where ho.was Italian Minister in 1875. He lias known personally most of the great people in politics and nooiety during the past 80 year-. As .a young man ho know Mario Louise of Parma, and he met. the Duko of Wellington when ho was n. mature diplomatist. Ho danced at the Royal Court of Naples, ;i.iid dined on board tho ship that took Napoleon's remains from St. Helena back to Paris, Count Greppi is small and .slight, and has a good show of grey hair and. whiskers, a. steady hand, a dry if somewhat laded grey eye, a linn voice, and a wonderful memory for names and faces. Ho does not givo you the impression of a centenarian, but of an elderly society man, w'hase courtly manners arc a relic of days long dead, Tmc to his motto of "Don't, Worry," ho takes no active part in politics. ' Count Qrcppi i.-i not. rich, but ho has enough fortune to live in quiet luxury, His last offer of marriage was from an American woman of unusual beauty, 20 yeare'.ago. Tor the Count never made an offer of-marriage in his long life ; ho leaves that to the iadies and—always refuses. His answer ih invariably, the same: "My heart aches t;> tell you so—but my doctors say I am not strong enough to marry." Tho fair American met him in Lucerne during tho season, fell in, love with this sprightly .bachelor of 80, was daz/.led af. his social connections, his name, his j:>er-' feet manners, and the pleasant life ho led. Shi- was many years younger than he. and her wish to become Countess ilreppi increased when a leader of Lu<erno society, for whose advice- she asked as to means of making the match, declared: "Marry Greppi! Why, ho would have been married 100 times over had he wished.'' i: lSut hv is so attentive to me, so publicly attentive.' 1 protested the would-be Countess Greppi. "He is attentive to all pretty women. Rut ho feels no emotion over it. He has never felt an emotion ill his life." Unconvinced, tho American, to the wondered; friends at Lucerne, took the bull by tiro horns, and sent, by another woma.u, a proposal to Count Greppi. 'Hie same evening Lucerne hoard that Count Greppi had loft the town, and gono back to Italy. l?y the fair lady's messenger ho pent his "heartfelt regrets; but his doctor had severely forbidden him tho married l ttate."