in HIS MEDICAL FRIENDS 25 



Bloomsbury, then a place of elegant resort. A notice 

 of this house will be given in another chapter. 



Amongst those who frequented his home at this 

 period, and to whom Fothergill gave counsel and help, 

 were three young doctors, trained at Edinburgh Lettsom, 

 Gilbert Thompson, and Anthony Fothergill a fuller 

 notice of whose careers is reserved to a later page. 

 Thompson's tastes were somewhat literary and academic ; 

 his work as a physician was hindered by a natural diffi- 

 dence. Anthony Fothergill, only distantly connected 

 with his namesake, was scientific, and had afterwards 

 considerable repute as a physician at Bath. Lettsom 

 entered on practice in the city of London under the aegis 

 of Fothergill, soon after the latter had moved to the 

 west. He had a ready flow of conversation, and an 

 equally facile pen ; was genial, generous, and humane ; 

 and enjoyed for many years the fame of a popular 

 physician and philanthropist. Lettsom founded in 1773 

 the Medical Society of London, one of the earliest of 

 those associations which have done so much to promote 

 general medicine. 



Fothergill himself had to do, as we shall .see later, with 

 two small societies, more private in their character. 

 One, the Medical Society (of Physicians), held a very 

 useful place from about 1752 onwards, receiving and 

 publishing essays on medical topics derived from both 

 home and foreign sources. Fothergill contributed many 

 of these papers, which were chiefly clinical descriptions 

 of disorders hitherto ill-recognised ; those on angina 

 pectoris, sick headache, and tic douloureux are among 

 the best known. The second society was the Society of 

 (Licentiate) Physicians, originally formed in 1767 to 

 defend the interests of the Licentiates, but papers were 

 afterwards read before it. 



His medical reputation was now universally acknow- 

 ledged. In 1774 he was proposed by Lord North to the 

 king for appointment as one of the royal physicians. 

 The king replied, " I doubt whether a Quaker can hold 

 an office, but if he can I have no objection to appointing 



