A GIGANTIC RELIC, 95 



wax figures in the old Boston Museum, and are accustomed to air their 

 fancy among the respectable fossils and gorgeous tropical birds in the 

 Museum of Natural History, have perhaps never so much as heard 

 of the wonder-exciting collection of anatomical curiosities known as 

 the Warren Museum. The building stands on Chestnut Street, a 

 quiet, tenantless alley, running from Charles Street to the Charles 

 River, but a few steps from Beacon Street and the Public Garden. 

 It is made of brick, with heavy iron doors and shutters, and of all 

 places would be the least likely to attract the eye of the stranger, 

 but for the inscription over the door — 



"erected by 

 DR. JOHN COLLINS WAftREN." 



Dr. John Collins Warren was the son of Dr. John Warren, a most 

 skillful surgeon in the American army during the Revolutionary War, 

 and the founder of the medical school in Harvard College. He was 

 educated in the best medical schools of London and Paris, and, on 

 the death of his father, in 1815, was elected Professor of Anatomy and 

 Surgery at Harvard College, and in 1820 was placed at the head of 

 the surgical department of the Massachusetts General Hospital, a po- 

 sition that he held for thirty-three years. During the latter period he 

 made the most extensive collection of anatomical specimens to be 

 found in the country. A part of these are still at the Massachusetts 

 General Hospital, a part at the Boston Museum of Natural History, 

 and a part, comprising the rarest and most valuable, constitute the 

 Warren Museum. 



The museum belongs to Dr. Warren's heirs. For a considerable 

 period after his decease, they used to open it on certain days to the 

 public, but it ceased to excite curiosity, and it is now only opened by 

 special permission, on application to members of the family. Every 

 courtesy is extended to those who wish to visit the place for scientific 

 purposes, although no provision was made in Dr. Warren's will for 

 the preservation of the relics or care of the building. 



The curiosities collected by Dr. Warren, which are to be seen in 

 the Boston Museum of Natural History, are comparatively unimpor- 

 tant. The biography of the highwayman, Walton, bound in his own 

 skin, attracts the lovers of sensation, and the cast of the French horned 

 lady, and the skeletons of certain rickety Indians, seem to be particu- 

 larly appetizing to children. The anatomical specimens, showing how 

 near a person may come to death, and yet escape, are, however, inter- 

 esting. Among these, is the cranium of the once famous Vermonter, 

 who lived twelve years and a half after the passage of an iron bar 

 through his head, the consequence of an accident in blasting rocks. 

 He used to travel about New England, exhibiting himself and his bar. 

 He died in California about the year 1860. The bar was three feet 



