72 NATURAL HISTORY. 



both of these distinguished men having been of an 

 irascible and irritable temperament. William Hunter 

 accumulated a very extensive museum, mostly of ana- 

 tomical and physiological preparations, the whole of 

 which he left to the University of Glasgow, in which it 

 constitutes the well-known Hunterian Museum. He 

 was born in 1718, and died in 1783. 



As above said, John Hunter finding, when in his 

 twentieth year, that he was still without any profession, 

 determined to visit his brother William, with a view of 

 qualifying himself as a medical man. William Hunter 

 not only consented to receive his brother, but at once 

 placed him as a pupil in his dissecting-room, and also 

 made arrangements for his studying surgery under 

 Cheselden, then the most celebrated surgeon of his 

 day. In anatomy, John Hunter's progress was so rapid, 

 that in 1749 he became demonstrator to his brother, and 

 it was in this capacity that he laid the foundation of that 

 marvellous manipulative skill for which he was in later 

 life so famous. He likewise prosecuted his studies in 

 surgery, which at that time was much less truly scientific 

 than it now is, with the greatest zeal. After acting as 

 assistant to William Hunter for about five years, John 

 was received into partnership with his brother as ana- 

 tomical lecturer (in 1755). He was, however, at this 

 time, as he continued to be all through his life, but a 

 very indifferent lecturer j whereas his brother William was 

 celebrated for the ease of his delivery and the flowing style 

 of his prelections. 



The next four years of John Hunter's life are little more 

 than a mere record of incessant hard work; and the 



