How old does the Englishman say the alchemist is? How has he come to be that old?

The
Englishman is obsessed with alchemy. The text tells readers that he spent most of his father's
fortune in pursuit of learning the secrets of that mysterious art. In one of the textbooks about
alchemy and the Philosopher's Stone, the Englishman read about a very old and knowledgeable
alchemist. The alchemist is supposedly more than two hundred years old.  

He had spent enormous amounts of time at...