VESALIUS. 75 



courtier. As a practitioner he was held in high esteem. 

 When the life of Don Carlos, Philip's son, was despaired 

 of, it was Vesalius who was called in, and who, seeing 

 that the surgeons had bound up the wound in the head 

 so tightly that an abscess had formed, promptly brought 

 relief to the patient by cutting into the pericranium. 

 The cure of the prince, however, was attributed by the 

 court to the intercession of St. Diego, and it is possible 

 that on the subject of this alleged miraculous recovery 

 Vesalius may have expressed his opinion rather more 

 strongly than it was safe for a Netherlander to do. At 

 any rate, the priests always looked upon him with dislike 

 and suspicion, and at length they and the other enemies 

 of the great anatomist had their revenge. 



A young Spanish nobleman had died, and Vesalius, 

 who had attended him, obtained permission to ascertain, 

 if possible, by a post-mortem examination, the cause of 

 death. On opening the body, the heart was said by 

 the bystanders to beat ; and a charge, not merely of 

 murder, but of impiety also, was brought against Vesalius. 

 It was hoped by his persecutors that the latter charge 

 would be brought before the Inquisition, and result in 

 more rigorous punishment than any that would be in- 

 flicted by the judges of the common law. The King of 

 Spain, however, interfered and saved him, on condition 

 that he should make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. 

 Accordingly he set out from Madrid for Venice, and 



