FAMOUS PEOPLE

Evening Post, Volume LXXXV, Issue 21, 25 January 1913, Page 12

FAMOUS PEOPLE

THEIR CHANCES OF LONG LIFE. Sir Sidney Lee, who has just .completed a supplement to the Dictionary of National' Biography, bringing the total number of memoirs up to^ 31,755, writes a most interesting article of his task in the Nineteenth Century. "Of the 1635 melt and women commemorated," he says, "almost all of whom shays haye v given proof of mental exer> tiott and were fairly successful in the affairs '-of the World j the average length of life approaches Beventy years. Nearly 400, indeed, died after their- eightieth birtbday'i and of these fouv were centenarians. It cann6t be unfair to conclude that sußteined intellectual effort is no bar either to longevity or to a' reasonable > measure of hapftiness in the cours« of life's pilgrimage.* 1 What' is the proportion of „fatnous people to the common crowd? What aye the chahces of a man or wom&h finding themselves commemorated in' the pages of the ;" Dictionary 'of ■ National Biography"? t <, "Tho new volumes maintain the former statistical proportions between the pel-sons commemorated in- the pages ahd the population," says Sir Sydney. " Eaci of the last eleven years yields 150 recruits, and they come as before from all VFPfM** . Um>ted Kingdom and of tho British Empire. "?fe* H" 68 , oi ihe aggregate annual mortality for the prescribed period show that, of every 4000 persons who died at adult age, one finde ( a place in the national biographic record. The same ratio of distinction (Is 4000) prevailed throughout the nineteenth century ai> cording to the Dictionary's previous stan-