Sir James Young Simpson and chloroform (1811-1870) / by H. Laing Gordon.

  • Gordon, H. Laing (Henry Laing)
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sir James Young Simpson and chloroform (1811-1870) / by H. Laing Gordon. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    the greatest living obstetrician, and Reid rose to be Professor of Physiology in St. Andrew’s University. Mac Arthur never became famous ; his name is known only because of the initial impetus which his influence gave to the professional careers of his two young friends. In his close association with two such men as MacArthur and Reid, Simpson was again fortunate in his environment. The art of medicine was also fortunate inasmuch as at the right moment the right influences were at work to direct his mind towards it. While occupied in mastering the laws of hexameter and iambic or in assimilating the prescribed portion of Virgil and Tacitus, he happily now and then, living with two such enthusiastic medical students, got a taste of the more stimulating study of things scientific—food which was more agreeable to his mental palate, more suited to his mental digestion. By peeps into anatomical books, by little demonstra- tions of specimens in their lodgings, and by occasional visits to some of the lecture rooms or the wards of the Infirmary, his appetite was whetted for that great study of nature which his youthful training at Bathgate had prepared him for, and for which his mental constitution was specially adapted. One can picture the eagerness with which he would cast aside the finished Greek or Latin essay and urge the not unwilling embryo professor to demonstrate a bone or lecture on an anatomical preparation. \