SIXES AND SEVENS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 276, 18 May 1912, Page 1 (Supplement)

SIXES AND SEVENS

CURIOUS CHAIN OF COINCIDENCES. : In (crested by the curious speculations which Leap Year Day births have inspired, Mrs. Swallow, widow of the rector of Weston Favel, in Northamptonshire, of which living she is the patron, wrote to the Daily Mail mentioning a strange circumstance in her career—that of im extraordinary sequence of sevens. Mrs. Swallow is now on a visit to the vicar of St. Paul's, West Smethwick, Birmingham. and at the vicarage she told the story. "1 am." she said, "the seventh child of a seventh child of a seventh child. I was born on the seventh day of the seventh month of the year. My husband. the Rev. William Swallow, had seven letters in each of his names. My Christian name, Amelia, unfortunately falls just short of maintaining the sequence. Quite without design oil our part, my engagement ring bore the words ••for ever," which contain seven letters. On my twenty-first birthday T received two or three rings as presents; by the purest coincidence each was set with seven stones. I was married in a year of my age which represented a multiple of seven. "It was then noticed—and this was the first time that the persistence of seven as my lucky number impressed me —that both the Christian names and the surnames of all the witnesses to mv marriage certificate contained seven letters. After our marriage we went to live in Durham, which is built on seven hills, and i- famous for seven historic churches. At. f!ie first service which wc attended in the cathedral Canon Farrar preached on •The seven golden candlesticks.' "I wish T could pursue the sequence and sa.v that I was a mother of seven, but a* a matter of sober history my family is confined to two big boys, both of whom are going info the Church. "I suppose we all have a bit of superstition iu ns. Mv own fancy was —I like In indulge it- that, mv lucky number had it- influence in endowing me with my good luck in life. Tn every enterprise T took T was successful. And the greatest, luck of mv life, transcending all material things, has been my supremely happy domestic existence. Tn my husband's days we had the merriest home on earth."