And I was informed that in the marshes on the other side of the
river over against Candy Island there was a farmer who was then
living with the five-and-twentieth wife, and that his son, who was
but about thirty-five years old, had already had about fourteen.
Indeed, this part of the story I only had by report, though from
good hands too; but the other is well known and easy to be inquired
into about Fobbing, Curringham, Thundersly, Benfleet, Prittlewell,
Wakering, Great Stambridge, Cricksea, Burnham, Dengy, and other
towns of the like situation. The reason, as a merry fellow told
me, who said he had had about a dozen and a half of wives (though I
found afterwards he fibbed a little) was this: That they being
bred in the marshes themselves and seasoned to the place, did
pretty well with it; but that they always went up into the hilly
country, or, to speak their own language, into the uplands for a
wife. That when they took the young lasses out of the wholesome
and fresh air they were healthy, fresh, and clear, and well; but
when they came out of their native air into the marshes among the
fogs and damps, there they presently changed their complexion, got
an ague or two, and seldom held it above half a year, or a year at
most; "And then," said he, "we go to the uplands again and fetch
another;" so that marrying of wives was reckoned a kind of good
farm to them. It is true the fellow told this in a kind of
drollery and mirth; but the fact, for all that, is certainly true;
and that they have abundance of wives by that very means. Nor is
it less true that the inhabitants in these places do not hold it
out, as in other countries, and as first you seldom meet with very
ancient people among the poor, as in other places we do, so, take
it one with another, not one-half of the inhabitants are natives of
the place; but such as from other countries or in other parts of
this country settle here for the advantage of good farms; for which