SURGICAL PRACTICE. 133 



practice. As few professors in the Scotch universities 

 have private means apart from the emoluments of 

 office to carry on scientific pursuits efficiently, Goodsir's 

 adhesion to practice was of twofold aim. To uphold 

 the chair of anatomy as he began and carried on its 

 management from first to last was exceedingly heavy 

 upon his purse, and as the wider range of scientific 

 research could only be accomplished by an addition to 

 his income, he wished to strengthen his hands by other 

 professional means. Practice also, by withdrawing 

 him from too rigid a pursuit of science, would have 

 been a healthful and useful relaxation of the highest 

 import. Above all other considerations, however, in 

 his eyes was the command of wards in a surgical 

 hospital to enable him to illustrate his professorial 

 teaching, and to make it more largely efficient and 

 beneficial to the interests of his class. With these 

 established data in his mind he applied for the first 

 vacancy of assistant- surgeon in the Eoyal Infirmary of 

 Edinburgh* in 1848, but unluckily did not obtain it. 

 He was much disappointed, and so expressed himself 

 to the managers of the institution, whom he believed 

 to have acted on a foregone conclusion rather than on 

 the merits of the applicants. An obstacle had been 

 thrown in his way when, as he thought, there was 

 nx-iii for all the Labourers in the field, if a true gene- 

 rosity and foresightedness for ultimate good had pre- 

 vailed in the decisions of the governing body. The 



ll' bo une a Fellow of the Royal College of S ii>i. yeai (i 



in :ill probability to provide himself with the needful qualification of bo pita] 



i" ill- Roj a lulu 11. < 



