Maxwell Simpson. 175 



MAXWELL SIMPSON. 18151902. 



On the 26th day of February, 1902, died at West Kensington an 

 eminent chemist of the last generation. 



Maxwell Simpson, B.A., M.B., M.D., LL.D. (Hon. Dub.), D.Sc., 

 F.R.S., F.C.S., F.I.C., F.K.Q.C.P. (Dub.), Member of the Senate of the 

 Queen's University, son of Thomas Simpson, Esq., of Beach Hill, 

 Co. Armagh, Ireland, was born on March the 15th, 1815, and was 

 educated at the famous private school of Dr. Henderson, at Newry, 

 Co. Down, from whence he proceeded to Trinity College, Dublin. Dr. 

 Lever, the celebrated novelist, an enthusiastic admirer of physiology, 

 by means of his brilliant conversation, caused young Simpson to choose 

 medicine as his profession. Accordingly, he attended besides the 

 lectures of the arts course also lectures on medical subjects. His taste 

 for medicine, however, did not improve with knowledge, and after four 

 years of study he left Trinity College without a medical degree. He 

 next went to London, where he stayed for some- years. From London 

 Simpson made once an excursion to Paris. On this occasion he attended 

 a lecture of the celebrated chemist, Dumas, who, by his brilliant 

 discourse, induced Simpson to choose chemistry as a profession. 

 Accordingly, after his return to London, he attended the lectures of 

 Prof. Graham, at University College, and also worked in the professor's 

 laboratory. 



Maxwell Simpson married, in 1845, Mary, the second daughter of 

 the late Samuel Martin, of Loughorne, Co. Down, a lady who shared 

 with him all the vicissitudes of life for 55 years, and to whom he was 

 most affectionately attached. They settled in Dublin, where Simpson, 

 in 1847, accepted the Chair of Chemistry in the Medical School of Park 

 Street. Every lecturer at this Institution was expected to hold a 

 medical degree. To satisfy this regulation he took up his medical 

 studies again, passed the prescribed examinations, and took the degree 

 of M.B. In the following year, 1848, he exchanged his chair in Park 

 Street for one in the Medical School of St. Peter's Street, Dublin, where 

 he delivered lectures before large classes till the spring of 1851. 



Until the end of the first quarter of the last century instruction in 

 practical chemistry could not be obtained at the Universities. 

 Laboratories existed, but they were only intended for the private use 

 of the professor. It is one of the merits of Liebig to have superseded 

 this state of things, and to have founded, in 1824, at Giessen, a large 

 laboratory for the instruction of students in practical chemistry. The 

 School of Chemistry at Giessen soon became famous ; students came 

 from all parts of Europe to study chemistry under the guidance of 



