med for several years to go down stairs after
she was undressed, to _smoke a pipe_. Her daughter, who slept with
her, did not miss her till the morning, when on going down stairs, she
found her mother's body extended _over the hearth_, and appearing
like a block of wood burning with a glowing fire, without flame. She
was, no doubt, in the act of lighting her pipe, either at the fire or
candle, and the breath issuing from her mouth during respiration, being
impregnated with the spirits she had lately drunk, caught fire, and
communicated with the animal substance, also impregnated with spirit,
and thus the body was destroyed. Indeed, in nearly all the cases of this
nature reported, the bodies have been found on the hearth, or the
persons have been left with a candle near them. The combustion of the
human body in these cases is generally entirely inward, and it is very
seldom that any of the contiguous articles are destroyed. In the
instance mentioned above, a child's clothes on one side of the woman,
and a paper screen were untouched, and the deal floor on which she lay
was not even discoloured.

The most remarkable instance of this nature on record, is that of the
Countess Cornelia Bandi; she was in the sixty-second year of her age,
and on the day before well as usual. After she was in bed she conversed
with her maid for two or three hours, and then fell asleep. The servant
on going into her chamber in the morning, saw her lady's two feet
distant from the bed, a heap of ashes, and two legs with the stockings
on. Between the latter was part of the head, but the brains, half the
skull, and the chin, were burnt to ashes, which, when taken up in the
hand, left a greasy and offensive moisture. The bed received no damage,
and the clothes were elevated on one side, as by a person rising from
beneath them. She appears to have been burnt standing, from the skull
being found between her legs; the back was damaged more than the front
of the head, partly because of the hair, and partly because in the face
there were several openings, out of which the flames are likely to
have issued. In this account it is not stated either that she was of
intemperate habits, or that a candle was left in the room with her; but
the latter is very likely, she being advanced in years; and it may be
conjectured, that in rising from her bed, she caught fire.

One Borelli observes, that such accidents often happen to great drinkers
of wine and brandy, and