156 HUMAN DISSECTION. ITS DRAMA AND STRUGGLE 



lasted for a duration of 126 years. During this time, students 

 flocked to that city from all over the world. As many as 400 re- 

 sided there during one session for the purpose of studying anatomy 

 at the University. However, Monro the first, began with fifty- 

 seven pupils and did his teaching in the anatomical theatre, or 

 Surgeon's Hall, as it was called, which belonged to the Royal Col- 

 lege of Surgeons. 



Due to public concern over the status of the resurrection- 

 ists, the Royal College of Surgeons made the regulation, in 1721, 

 that all anatomical students be required to sign an agreement 

 or indenture promising not to participate in grave robbing. They 

 offered to pay 5 pounds to anyone proving a pupil guilty of such 

 a misdemeanor. This ruling was ineffective for the students con- 

 sidered it a point of honor to see that their own teacher had 

 enough cadavers; a spirited rivalry, not always friendly, developed 

 between the groups from different schools. For example, the pupils 

 of one lecturer, on hearing that another band was planning on 

 raising a body on a particular night, secreted themselves among 

 the gravestones until after the body had been removed and the 

 grave refilled with soil. Then they suddenly appeared, wearing 

 ghostly white sheets and emitting wild shrieks to the confusion 

 of the opposition, who fled leaving the territory to the invaders. 



Monro I changed his pedagogic quarters to a place within 

 the confines of the University walls, in the year of 1725, in re- 

 sponse to mob violence of some proportion, directed against Sur- 

 geon's Hall. The edifice stood in peril of being completely de- 

 molished following the discovery of a body snatching incident by 

 certain members of the populace. They destroyed the windows 

 and threatened the life of the eminent professor as well as his 

 assistants and students (Ball, '28; Creswell, '14; Lonsdale, 1870; 

 Watson, '36). This anatomist made some innovations in teach- 

 ing anatomy: he extended the course so it continued from 0( 

 tober to May and included some history of anatomy, osteology, 

 pathology, physiology and comparative anatomy. 



It was customary in Edinburgh at that time to advertise 

 the anatomizing of a human subject in one of the daily news- 

 papers. The following is one which was written in the Daily 

 Advertiser of January 15, 1742: "Notice is hereby given that 



