These statistics seem to have been made with the idea of
illustrating the marvelous rather than to give the usual
prolongation of these functions. It hardly seems possible that
ordinary investigation would show no cases of menstruation
between sixty and seventy, and seven cases between seventy and
eighty; however, in searching literature for such a collection,
we must bear in mind that the more extraordinary the instance,
the more likely it is that it would be spoken of, as the natural
tendency of medical men is to overlook the important ordinary and
report the nonimportant extraordinary. Dewees mentions an example
of menstruation at sixty-five, and others at fifty-four and
fifty-five years. Motte speaks of a case at sixty-one; Ryan and
others, at fifty-five, sixty, and sixty-five; Parry, from
sixty-six to seventy seven; Desormeux, from sixty to
seventy-five; Semple, at seventy and eighty seven; Higgins, at
seventy-six; Whitehead, at seventy-seven; Bernstein, at
seventy-eight; Beyrat, at eighty-seven; Haller, at one hundred;
and highest of all is Blancardi's case, in which menstruation was
present at one hundred and six years. In the London Medical and
Surgical Journal, 1831, are reported cases at eighty and
ninety-five years. In Good's System of Nosology there are
instances occurring at seventy-one, eighty, and ninety years.
There was a woman in Italy whose menstrual function continued
from twenty-four to ninety years. Emmet cites an instance of
menstruation at seventy, and Brierre de Boismont one of a woman
who menstruated regularly from her twenty-fourth year to the time
of her death at ninety-two.

Strasberger of Beeskow describes a woman who ceased menstruating
at forty-two, who remained in good health up to eighty, suffering