Address to the Society of the Alumni of the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery / By James Robinson.

  • Robinson, James.
Date:
1850
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Address to the Society of the Alumni of the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery / By James Robinson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    35/42 (page 5)
    decisive. “Dear sir, the only advertisements which have been inserted by direction of the Marquis of Abercorn, were those that appeared in the Times and Morning Herald. Your obedient servant, John Froggart.” [This was the original paragraph which Mr. Robinson had refused to insert without comment.] Finding that some concealed and apparently unscrupulous enemy was at work to damage his character, Mr. Robinson directed his solicitor to apply to the newspapers in which these spurious advertisements appeared, for the name of the party who caused them to be inserted. The replies received from the Daily JYews and Athenaeum, were simply a reference to Mr. John Froggart, solicitor to the Marquis of Abercorn, 16, Clifford’s Inn! The trick was transparent enough—the parties inserting these advertisements not being aware that Mr. Robinson had been in communication with Mr. Froggart, flat¬ tered themselves that a reference to the solicitor of the Marquis of Aber¬ corn would put a stop to all further inquiry on his part. That there might be no mistake, however, the answers from the Daily JYews and the Athe¬ naeum were forwarded to Mr. Froggart, and his answer was, that if he was referred to as the solicitor of these parties, “there must be some mistake in the matter—I have not the pleasure of being acquainted with either gentleman, and I have no instructions from them of any kind!” The deception that had been practiced upon Mr. Robinson and the public, was thus unmasked, and further evidence of authorship was not long want¬ ing. The respectable publishers of Piccadilly, Messrs. Webster & Co., at the request of Mr. Robinson, had applied to the Lancet and Medical Times, with that object, and both these papers in the most honorable and creditable manner, at once admitted that the paragraphs signed “Aber¬ corn” and dated “Chesterfield House” had been sent to them for inser¬ tion, by Messrs. Saunders & Ottley, publishers! When we state that the leading partner in the house of Saunders & Ottley is the near relative, we believe the father, of Mr. Edwin Saunders, who succeeded by ■pur¬ chase to the business and position of the late Mr. A. Nasmyth, Dentist to the Q,ueen, we have said enough to show the origin and the animus of the discreditable persecution and attempted vilification to which Mr. Rob¬ inson has been subjected throughout this affair. Believing that it only required a full disclosure of such extraordinary proceedings, to induce the Marquis of Abercorn to take immediate steps to call to account the parties who had made so unwarrantable a use of his name, a full state¬ ment of the entire case was forwarded to his lordship, by Mr. Robinson. In justice to that gentleman we cannot withhold a few of his closing re¬ marks. “Permit me, in conclusion, to observe, that highly as I should value an honorary distinction conferred upon me by any member of the royal family, its bestowal, or subsequent withdrawal without any good cause assigned, cannot add to, or detract from, my professional standing, so long as I can vindicate myself from the unjustifiable attacks which pri-