The place of the Tudor Surgeons in English Literature / by Sir D'Arcy Power, K.B.E., F.R.C.S.

  • Power, D'Arcy, Sir, 1855-1941.
Date:
[1927?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The place of the Tudor Surgeons in English Literature / by Sir D'Arcy Power, K.B.E., F.R.C.S. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    60 Spencer: Wolveridge’s “Speculum Matricis” Section Y and onwards contains the Dialogue between Eutrapelia, the Midwife, and Philadelphos, the Doctor. At p. 78 appears the following :— Dr. Philadelphos (addressing Mrs. Eutrapelia): “Having thus run through births, as well natural as preternatural, I shall give you the reason (and that in my own opinion) why these births are of so various and different postures in the womb, observing not alwaies the same posture : and ’tis thus. Because the infant swimming in water and moving itself, sometimes this way, sometimes that way and is bent and tumbled several waies ; insomuch, that sometimes it is strangely entangled with its own navil-cord, which I am confident you have seen in your own experience oftentimes.” This is taken almost verbatim, without acknowledgment, from W. Harvey’s Generation of Living Creatures, 1653, p. 471. “ For he swimmeth in a water, and moveth himself to and fro, he stretcheth himself now this way and anon that, and so is variously inflected and tumbled up and down ; in so much that sometimes, being entangled in his own Navel-string, he is strangely insnared.” Wolveridge throws some light on the contemporary management of the puer- perium, for he advises:— “ That women be kept in their beds for five daies at least after their delivery. I know ’tis usual for them to rise at three daies ; but this to be sure the longer women contein themselves in their bed the more secure they are from danger.” So much for James Wolveridge and his printed book. The main object of the present communication is to call attention to the fact that in the Obstetrical Society’s Library, now incorporated with the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, we possess two MS. copies of this rare work, one indifferently written and the other, made by one who modestly signs his initials J. L. J., a beautiful specimen of penmanship and draughtsmanship which make it one of the treasures of our Library. I purpose to give some account of the origin and author of this magnificent manuscript copy of a very rare book. In the year 1884 a copy of the printed work was known to be in the possession of Dr. Fordyce Barker, of New York, and the Obstetrical Society of London had endeavoured to obtain a manuscript copy of the book. But Dr. Aveling reported1 that:— “ The attempt of the Society to obtain a transcript of James Wolveridge’s work on Midwifery, Dublin, 1670,- had failed, the man whom Dr. Fordyce Barker had employed to copy the hook having absconded3 with the volume and died in Europe. By this loss of the only known copy of Wolveridge’s work it is feared the earliest original work on Midwifery in the English language has been irretrievably lost.” Extracts from Minutes of the Council of the Obstetrical Society of London. April 2, 1884, meeting. “ Two letters were read, one from Dr. Fordyce Barker, thanking the Society for a cheque for T5 sent him to procure the copying of a rare work (Speculum Matricis) and stating that the copyist having disappeared with the book and then died (as reported) he had been unable to get it copied ; he returned the cheque. A letter from Dr. Wiltshire on the same subject was read.” April 28, 1884, meeting. “ Dr. Aveling proposed that a M.S. copy of Wolveridge’s Speculum Matricis be made and that Dr. Cullingworth be empowered to incur the necessary expense.” 1 Trans. Obst. Soc. Lond., 1884, xxvi, 31. 2 It should have been London, 1671. 3 From information furnished by Dr. Clement Godson it appears that the copyist, a Frenchman named Bourgeaud, did not abscond, hut died in great poverty in New York before the copying was completed. Brit. Med. Journ., March 1, 1884.