APPENDIX. 99 



style of his letter convinced me it was not meant as an apology, 1 

 as likewise did the style of a short note written on the cover 

 of that letter, of which note the following is a copy. 



To Mr. Hewson, fyc. 



SIR, When you have read the inclosed, you are very wel- 

 come to write such remarks on it as to you, or to your friend 



Dr. H r, or to any of his friends, such as Dr. , &c. may 



seem proper; only when you have done, I think you ought to 

 show it to all those societies, physicians, and students to whom 

 you have made free with my name ; or, if this talk should not 

 suit your disposition, or be irksome to you, after the great 

 fatigue you have taken about me already, please to let me know 

 this, and I shall take that trouble on myself. I am, sir, &c. 



(Signed) ALEX. MONRO. 



Edinburgh, June 24, 1769. 



This seemed clearly not to be the style of one who was sen- 

 sible of his error, and was apologizing for it ; and convinced 

 me that Professor Monro intended that letter as a proof of his 

 right to those discoveries. However, not to be positive that I 

 had hit upon his meaning, I determined, before I laid anything 

 before the public, to ask an explanation of that letter. For 

 this purpose I wrote to him on the 15th of July, and desired 

 him to tell me " whether he meant it as a proof of his right to 

 those discoveries ;" or, " whether he meant by it to give up to 

 me the right to them." And as I had found him in that letter 

 wandering from the subject, and instead of concluding that he 

 really had seen those vessels, concluding only that he had seen 

 what he suspected to be the lacteals in birds. And again, that 

 lie was persuaded birds were provided with those vessels, but 

 nowhere saying that he had seen what he knew or could prove 

 to be their lacteals, which alone could give him a right to the 

 discovery I therefore told him " that, to avoid for the future 

 all wandering from the subject, I should state the dispute as 

 it appeared to me;" and then I said that "it was he who 

 began it, for, on hearing that I had discovered the lymphatic 



1 As for instance where he talks " of (his)- making all the allowance I require for 

 my natural, or," says he, " I should rather call it, unnatural imbecility of memory." 

 This passage is altered in his ' State of Facts,' p. 22. 



