JEFFRIES WYMAN 175 



It does not appear that young Wyman had any special prefer- 

 ence for the practice of medicine; he was emphatically a born 

 naturalist. But at that period naturalists, as a class, hardly ex- 

 isted; the very word, as in the well-known anecdote of Agassiz 

 and his colleagues in the White Mountains, was in danger of 

 interpretation as equivalent to "naturals." The lecture-room and 

 the illustrated magazine had not then become familiar mediums 

 for scientific instruction and personal income. With few excep- 

 tions the naturalists of the time were practitioners; their vocation 

 was medicine; science was merely an avocation. At all events 

 Wyman could see no means of gratifying his natural history tastes 

 other than by joining his father's profession. Soon after his 

 graduation, in 1833, he entered the Harvard Medical School, and 

 pursued his studies, partly with his father and partly with Dr. 

 John C. Dalton, father of the distinguished physiologist of the 

 same name. 



In the spring of 1837, he received the degree of M. D., presenting 

 a graduation thesis, entitled "De oculo," with drawings. This 

 was never printed; but soon afterward (September, 1837) he 

 published in The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal his first 

 paper, " On the Indistinctness of Images Formed by Oblique Rays 

 of Light," a physiologic essay for which his anatomic thesis con- 

 stituted a natural foundation. 



Soon after graduation he opened an office in Boston on Howard 

 Street (not Harvard or Washington, as sometimes stated). What 

 practice he had is not known; we may be assured that he pre- 

 pared for it diligently, awaited it patiently, and attended to it faith- 

 fully. He was soon appointed demonstrator of anatomy at the 

 medical college under Dr. John C. Warren. It is the duty of the 

 demonstrator to aid the lecturer by making in advance the dis- 

 sections and preparations needed to illustrate the exposition of the 

 structure of an organ or region ; for this office Wyman was particu- 

 larly well equipped, and he held it for two years. In July, 1838, 

 he also received a temporary appointment as assistant physician 

 at the Massachusetts General Hospital. 1 



1 To replace Dr. J. B. S. Jackson who was himself performing the duties in 



