

JS27.] [ 355 ] 



ON THE PLEASURES OF " BODY-SNATCHINO." 



As for entering into a defence of Resurrectionists, before expatiating on 

 their pleasures, it is out of the question. When a man has made up his 

 mind to the alternative of having his leg cut off, or of being lithotomised, 

 instead of losing his life, he does not bother himself as to the means by 

 \vhichthesurgeonacquired his dexterity; he does not care a straw for 

 the morality of the question. All he knows is, that it could not have 

 been on a living subject, unless operated on in articulo mortis, or when 

 phlebotomy had been used ml deliquium animi both against the rules of 

 the profession that his knife learnt its way through the labyrinth of 

 muscles, cartilages^ and all that, which envelope the human frame ; its 

 obedience, docility, and sweetness to the hand that guides it; and that 

 calm savageness (if you understand me) of its flourish at the critical 

 moment, which does any one's heart but the patient's good to sec it. 

 lie would not give a straw at that juncture (lying on his back, with his 

 teeth meeting in a leaden bullet) to know, whether his defunct predecessors 

 had found their way to the dissecting- room from the church-yard, or the 

 gallows' -foot in a shell coffin, or in an old sack. But when the opera- 

 tion is well over, and the man begins to stump about the world again, the 

 case is altered. Conscientious scruples make their appearance : consider- 

 ations religious, moral, sentimental, humbugical, and anti-surgical 

 especially, the thought of one's friends being cut up, bring? an awkward 

 feel with it much more so, of one's-self. This is the whole secret of tlio 

 matter. Would any man, woman, or child in the world- say a syllable 

 against the thing, if they were sure, for themselves and their immediate 

 relations, of escaping? Certainly not. Selfishness is the leading prin- 

 ciple of our opponents. Relations' are, some way or other, a part of our- 

 selves but how or why, is past even the surgeon's finding out; and, as 

 for ourselves, I grant you, one likes to save one's bacon even- to the last 

 day. 



For ray own part, I became an amateur at a very early age. 1 was 

 apprenticed to-lMr. L - , a surgeon, in a small town about forty miles 

 from London. He was a clever operator, and deeply learned in the 

 arcana of the human body, but yet not in good practice. The reason 

 was, that he attended more to the literature than to the business of his pro- 

 fession he spent too much time in his study; and in place of busying 

 himself, like a sensible man, about the persons and pockets of the present 

 generation, he gave himself up almost wholly to the next writing instruc- 

 tions, forsooth, to future anatomists, in place of turning his knowledge to 

 the practical benefit of his own time and of himself. My father's house 

 was at some distance from the town, and the nearest road to it thanks to 

 the genius who presided over my destiny! was through the church-yard. 

 The first time I took this short cut, I cannot say I relished it very well 

 particularly as my visits home were always in the evening, after we had 

 shut the shop. The shadows of the tomb-stones in the moonlight had a 

 queer appearance; the waving and sighing of some tall willows that looked 

 over the wall disturbed me ; and, on the whole, I thought the scene, 

 although striking, rather unpleasant than otherwise. It was some -nights 

 before I could prevail upon myself to take the same road again ; at last, 

 however, I ventured not influenced solely by a desire to save the dis- 

 tance, but also impelled by a kind of curiosity or, I don't know what 

 t&e first stirrings, I have no doubt, of my embryo genius towards the field, 



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