Biographical Sketch of Dr Prichard. 223 



continued to gratify and instruct us by further productions 

 of his well-stored mind ; in fact the subject of my last conver- 

 sation with him, as we walked together from the last meeting 

 of this Society at which he presided, was the publication of a 

 collection of plates of human skulls, illustrative of ethnology, 

 somewhat on the plan of the " Crania Americana'" of my ft'iend 

 Dr Morton, of Philadelphia. 



It cannot fail to be a matter of surprise and wonder, when 

 the nature of the Doctor's private practice, and the character 

 of his official duties, which called him much from home, are 

 considered, how he was able to accomplish so much. I have 

 been informed that he not only had acquired the rare and in- 

 valuable habit of saving and occupying those detached frag- 

 ments of time which it is most difficult not to lose, but that 

 he also possessed the remarkable faculty of being able at once 

 to resume and proceed with his compositions at the point at 

 which he had left them. 



Dr Prichard appeared to be in possession of his usual health 

 till Avithin a few weeks of his death ; yet it is probable that 

 the unusual dampness of the latter part of the last year, to 

 which may be ascribed the remarkably low and atonic cha- 

 racters of almost every case of illness, had produced a latent 

 influence on his system, and prepared it to yield to the exciting 

 causes which were applied. 



He had left his home, and was engaged in one of his offi- 

 cial tours, when he was seized with a severe feverish attack 

 while visiting the Lunatic Asylums in the neighbourhood of 

 Salisbury, on the 4th of December 1848, and was confined 

 in that city until the 17tli, when he was conveyed to his own 

 house in London. The fever proved to be of a rheumatic 

 and gouty character, baffling all the efforts of medical skill, 

 and terminating his life, after much suffering, by pericarditis 

 (inflammation of the membrane containing the heart) and 

 extensive suppuration in the knee-joint. 



As a practitioner of medicine, Dr Prichard was remarkable 

 for decision on the character of disease, and for a promptness 

 and energy in the application of remedies. Many have been 

 the instances where, in extreme cases, the boldness of his 



