Sir James Young Simpson.

Date:
[1870?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sir James Young Simpson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    at the head of his class at school, and his thirst for knowledge was insatiable. At the age of fourteen he entered the University of Edinburgh and he was fortunate enough, in his second session, to be a successful competitor for a bursary ; but, although a regular and attentive student, it soon became evident that his reputation was not to be won either in classics, or mathematics, or moral philosophy. In a great measure through his association with an old school-fellow, a student of medicine, with whom he lodged, he very soon made choice of the medical profes¬ sion ; and from that time he devoted himself to prepara¬ tion for it as the work of his future life. He became a pupil of the celebrated Liston, whose certificates attest that he worked under him with great zeal and industry, both as a pupil in his classes and as a surgeon’s dresser in the Loyal Infirmary. Whilst yet scarcely nineteen years of age, he was admitted a member of the Loyal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh ; and at twenty-one he received his degree of Doctor of Medicine. The excellence of an inaugural dissertation, which he prepared for the latter occasion, attracted the atten¬ tion of Dr. John Thompson, a physician of great emi¬ nence and Professor of Pathology in the University, who immediately proposed to him to become his assistant in his practice—an offer which he promptly and thankfully accepted. Through the advice of Dr. Thompson he directed his special attention to the study of obstetric medicine, with the view of becoming a teacher of that department of medical science; and “with characteristic promptness, energy, and earnestness, he began at once to seek distinction in the scientific literature of the de¬ partment of his choice.” In the year 1837, five years after he had taken his degree, through the strong recommendation of Dr. Thompson, he was appointed Assistant Professor of Pathology; and in 1840, after a sharp and exciting contest, he was elected, by the narrow majority of one, Professor of Midwifery to the University. Up till now