322 HENRY INGERSOLL BOWDITCH. 



in twenty-nine journals or society transactions, with numberless short 

 articles on various subjects, attest the industry of his life. His letters 

 and notes and diaries are full of his work, with scarcely a mention of 

 his honors. He was so generous in the appreciation of what others 

 had done that he was constantly giving them praise which really be- 

 longed to himself. His epoch-making work in medicine was his thora- 

 centesis, his first operation with the Wymau aspirator having been 

 done in 1850, some time after Dr. Morrill Wyman's " brilliant oper- 

 ation." He always gave Dr. Wyman the credit of having discovered 

 the means of accomplishing this object, for which he had himself long 

 sought. But he recognized its value at once, and made such frequent 

 use of it as to demonstrate its merit fully, and to compel its adoption. 

 His publications upon this subject probably extended his reputation 

 more among physicians than any other of his writings. 



Dr. Bowditch revisited Europe in 1859, 1867, and 1870. He en- 

 joyed these vacations with boyish intensity, entering into the pleas- 

 ures afforded by leisure, art, science, literature, music, reviving his old 

 college love of the classics, renewing former friendships, and forming 

 new ties. In the earlier of these visits he introduced thoracentesis 

 for pleural effusions with such earnestness that it was first taken up 

 by Budd of London and Gairdner of Glasgow, and then became 

 generally adopted in Great Britain, and later upon the continent of 

 Europe. Precisely as in this country, its merit was for a long time 

 doubted, and it was regarded as being too full of risk, until Dr. Bow- 

 ditch's large experience, and his reiterated papers and reports of his 

 results from it, forced a recognition of its value upon the medical pro- 

 fession. In his last visit he gained the admiring friendship of Simon 

 and Buchanan, and made the work of our State Board of Health 

 known and respected in England. 



Dr. Bowditch's greatest title to honor from his professional asso- 

 ciates was his character. An earnest searcher after truth, he stimu- 

 lated and encouraged good work in others. Eager to keep abreast of 

 all the advances in medical science, and to further its progress, he 

 sought out the workers among the younger men, to learn from them, 

 and to inspire them with courage to go on with their work. Honest, 

 fearless, outspoken, he made friends of his enemies by the simplicity, 

 purity, sincerity, and unselfishness of his purpose. He compelled 

 an admiration of the right and a hatred of wrong. At the meetings 

 of the American Medical Association, at which he was constant in 

 attendance so long as his health permitted, men from Maine to Cali- 

 fornia caught the spirit of his enthusiasm ; they felt the stimulus of 



