438 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1800. 



heads, and proceed to inform you, 

 that, in the conrse of my medita- 

 tions aforesaid, I recollected a plan 

 put into my hands some years ago, 

 for 'conmmtingall punishments for 

 operations of pharmacy and sur- 

 gery." The worthy gentleman who 

 proposed this scheme had princi- 

 pally in his eye the frequency of 

 executions, which he thought dis- 

 graceful to a country boasting its 

 humanity; and his idea was, in- 

 stead of hanging so many felons, to 

 make them submit to certain ex- 

 periments and operations in physic 

 and surgery. Hereby, said he to 

 me, with all the enthusiasm of a 

 schemer, science will be promoted 

 as well as crimes punished, by 

 rogues being obliged to submit to 

 operations, which, I am sorry to 

 say, we can scarcely persuade honest 

 men to undergo, although their 

 lives are in danger ; and I know so 

 much of these operations, that I 

 will venture to say, that, if my 

 scheme be adopted, felons will 

 understand what it is to suffer the 

 pains of law better than ever they 

 did. 



This plan of my learned friend, 

 however, did not succeed at the time 

 it was proposed, and I know not 

 why; I am, however, hopeful that 

 it may meet with a more gracious 

 reception from the public at pre- 

 sent, when the invention of substi- 

 tutes is greatly the fashion, and 

 when we have ingenious men who 

 undertake to find substitutes for al- 

 most every necessary of life, from a 

 militia-man to a joint of meat. — 

 Now, as it is notorious that the 

 punishment of felons is very expen- 

 sive to government, and as govern- 

 ment, like all other well-regulated 

 families, must be sensible of the 

 hardness of the limes, I flatter mv- 



self I am performing an acceptable 

 service by proposing a cheap sub- 

 stitute for punishments. 



It is almost needless to say, that 

 the science of surgery is very much 

 obstructed by the want of oppor- 

 tunities for operations and experi- 

 ments before the student arrives at 

 actual practice upon his patients. — 

 It is a very awkward thing, and 

 would be very shocking if it were 

 known, that a surgeon should be able 

 to say to a patient, " sir, I am come 

 to cut off your leg; but as this is the 

 first time I ever performed the 

 operation, you must excuse me, if I 

 don't go through it as I could wish." 

 This, Mr. Editor, would surely be 

 very shocking and very unsafe ; 

 whereas, it is obvious, that by the 

 scheme I propose, at least twenty 

 students may go through the whole 

 series of operations in the course of 

 one Old Bailey sessions, greatly to 

 their improvement, and to the fur- 

 therance of the law. 



Another advantage would be, 

 that, as the operations of surgery 

 are very numerous,they mightafford 

 that variety of punishment which 

 seems very much wanted in order to 

 proportion punishments to crimes; 

 and the antipathy of the lower 

 classes to surgical operations is so 

 strong, that I trust 1 need not expa- 

 tiate on this as a powerful argument 

 in favour of the scheme. The sight 

 of a case of instruments would cre- 

 ate more terror than the sight of a 

 cat-o-nine-tails, which I am told 

 there are various ways to evade. — 

 For slight offences, or first offences, 

 it may perhaps be necessary to order 

 the felon to be put under the hands 

 of an apothecary's boy for a week 

 or fortnight. Crimes of the next 

 degree of atrocity miglit be punish- 

 ed by a gentle dislocation; as we 



