THE ROMANCE OF MEDICINE. 425 



It is curious to see the race between sin and science : how the tests of 

 the chemist even more than keep up with the craft of the murderer. 

 Some of our most celebrated poisons are of comparatively recent date. 

 Prussic acid was discovered, not so very many years ago, by Scheele 

 though poisoning by cherry-laurel was a well-known process ; and the 

 late Mr. Palmer, of Rugeley, first brought strychnine into such feloni- 

 ous popularity. The toxicologists can count up their martyrs to sci- 

 ence. It is curious to observe how each advancing wave of time blots 

 out the records of crime. The crime that was a national event becomes 

 a tradition is lost in a black abyss of forgetfulness. There, so far as 

 we are concerned, let such traditions rest. 



We come back, however, to the point of departure whence we di- 

 gressed. The culture of the medical man is also combined with a 

 very large experience of life in its broadest bearings and its intensest 

 moments. The education, instead of being confined to a single school, 

 has very commonly been carried on at several great medical centres. 

 Travel is more than ever becoming one of the marks of a highly- 

 trained medical man. There is a period of leisure for nearly every 

 medical man, which, rightly used, may be one of unspeakable precious- 

 ness and importance for him. This is the time that lies between the 

 call to a profession and the obtaining any large share of work. As a 

 rule, all preparatory studies have not done more than to break up the 

 ground, and prepare it for the fertilizing process. The real work is to 

 be done when the mind is released from tutors and governors, and can 

 concentrate itself on the thought and work of maturer years. Travel 

 is the opportunity that best enables a man to combine study, thought, 

 and observation. It is astonishing what a large and increasing space 

 is occupied in medical life by travel. It is now not at all uncommon 

 for English medical students to spend a great deal of time at the medi- 

 cal schools of Paris and Vienna. They generally prefer Paris to Vi- 

 enna, and London to either. The best medical men more than ever 

 seem to be familiarized with the scientific medical thought of Germany. 

 The custom of going out as medical officer to vessels is very largely on 

 the increase. Many young men go with the steamers that traverse the 

 regular ocean thoroughfares. Men who have risen to, or descended 

 from, eminence have been glad to take positions on the great lines of 

 steamers. They are found a most agreeable addition to all the social 

 arrangements with the drawback, however, of being obliged to sub- 

 sist in a chronic state of flirtation. Others take longer voyages, and, 

 generally speaking, seek a more adventurous line of life. Thus there 

 are, among men I have known, those who have gone to the Greenland 

 seas, round Cape Horn, to Australia, to India, and the Pacific islands, 

 and have gone, again and again, induced by the divine passion for 

 knowledge and travel. There would be many competitors for the 

 place of medical officer to travel with some of the expeditions that 

 nowadays go round the world. What such travel might be can be 



