Passages from the diary of a late physician / with notes and illustrations by the editor.

  • Warren, Samuel, 1807-1877.
Date:
1835
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Passages from the diary of a late physician / with notes and illustrations by the editor. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    Knowing the success which often attended professional author- ship, as tending to acquire for the writer a reputation for skill on the subject of which he treated, and introduce him to the notice of the higher members of his own profession, I determined to turn my attention that way. For several months I was up, early and late, at a work on Diseases of the Lungs. I bestowed incredible pains on it; and my toil was sweetened by my wife, who would sit by me in the long summer evenings like an angel, consohng and encouraging me with predictions of success. She lightened my la- bour by undertaking the transcription of the manuscript; and I thought that two or three hundred sheets of fair and regular hand- writing were heavily purchased by the impaired eyesight of the beloved amanuensis. When at length it was completed, having been read and revised twenty times, so that there was not a comma waaiing, I hurried, full of fluttering hopes and fears, to a well- known medical bookseller, expecting he would at once purchase the copy-right. Fifty pounds I had fixed in my own mind as the minimum of what I would accept; and I had already appropriated some little part of it towards buying a handsome silk dress for my wife. Alas! even in this branch of my profession, my hopes were doomed lo meet with disappointment. The bookseller received me with great civility ; listened to every word 1 had to say ; seemed to take some interest in my new views of the disease treated of, which I explained to him, and repeated—and ventured to assure him, that they would certainly attract public attention. My heart leaped for joy as I saw his business-like eye settled upon me with an ex- pression of attentive interest. After having almost talked myself hoarse, and flushed myself all over with excitement, he removed his spectacles, and politely assured me of his approbation of the work ; but that he had determined never lo publish any more me- dical books on his own account. I have the most vivid recollection of almost turning sick with chagrin. With a faltering voice I asked him if that was his unalterable determination ? He replied, it was; for he had lost too much by speculations of that sort. I tied up the manuscript, and withdrew. As soon as I left his shop, I let fall a scorching tear of mingled sorrow and mortification. I could almost have wept aloud. At that moment, whom should J meet but my dear wife ; for we had both been talking all night long, and all breakfast time, about the probable result of my interview with the bookseller; and her anxious affection would not permit her to wait my return. She had been pacing to and fro on the other side of the street, and flew to me on my leaving the shop. I could not