Harvey as a histologist, and certain less familiar facts of his life / [David Fraser Fraser-Harris].

  • Fraser-Harris, David Fraser, 1867-1937
Date:
[1908]
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Harvey as a histologist, and certain less familiar facts of his life / [David Fraser Fraser-Harris]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    in its centre there appears a leaping point of the colour of blood, so small that at one moment when it contracts it almost entirely escapes the eye, and again when it dilates it shows like the smallest spark of fire. . . . The above particulars you may perceive towards the close of the third day with very great attention and under the favour of a bright light (as of the sun), or ivith the assistance of a magnifying-glass; without these aids you would strain your eyes in vain, so slender is the purple line, so slight is the motion of the palpitating point.” 4. The fourth mention of this word is in chapter xix. of the De generatione. Here Harvey is describing the chick as it appears on the seventh day of its development. The expression perspicillis utenti occurs; the passage is thus translated by Willis (p. 253): “If the head be removed, the vessels ascending to the brain may be observed as bloody points, with the use of a magnifying-glass.” Now what is this Latin word translated “ magnifying-glass ” in these passages ? What is the nominative case of the word, oblique cases of which are “ perspicilli ” and “ perspicillis/'* for the nominative does not seem to occur in either the De motu or the De generatione ? In the first place, it need hardly be said, the word is not known to classical authors, though it is clearly derived from perspicio, “ I look thoroughly into,” “ I peer into.” On consulting a dictionary of post-classical and late Latin terms (Lexicon mediae et infimce Latinitatis, 1858, compiled by l’Abbe Migue), I find a word “ perspicilla ” with a synonym “ conspicilla ” first used, it would seem, in 1539. Is this “ perspicilla ” Harvey’s word ? In the Lexicon, “perspicilla” is translated “besides” or “ spectacles,” as though “ perspicilla ” was a plural form. If it is, it must be a neuter plural of the second declension. The nominative singular would therefore be “ perspicillum,” a form that does not occur in Harvey’s writings; its genitive singular would be “ perspicilli ” (“ ope perspicilli,” by the aid of a magnifying glass), whereas its dative and ablative plural would be “ perspicillis ” (“ utenti perspicillis,” i.e. using magnifying-glasses).