ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY 



time, realizing that some occupation must be select- 

 ed, he asked permission of his brother William to at- 

 tempt some dissections in his anatomical school in 

 London. To the surprise of his brother he made this 

 dissection unusually well; and being given a second, 

 he acquitted himself with such skill that his brother 

 at once predicted that he would become a great anato- 

 mist. Up to this time he had had no training of any 

 kind to prepare him for his professional career, and knew 

 little of Greek or Latin languages entirely unneces- 

 sary for him, as he proved in all of his life work. Ottley 

 tells the story that, when twitted with this lack of knowl- 

 edge of the " dead languages" in after life, he said of his 

 opponent, "I could teach him that on the dead body 

 which he never knew in any language, dead or living." 



By his second year in dissection he had become so 

 skilful that he was given charge of some of the classes 

 in his brother's school; in 1754 he became a surgeon's 

 pupil in St. George's Hospital, and two years later 

 house - surgeon. Having by overwork brought on 

 symptoms that seemed to threaten consumption, he 

 accepted the position of staff -surgeon to an expedition 

 to Belleisle in 1760, and two years later was serving 

 with the English army at Portugal. During all this 

 time he was constantly engaged in scientific researches, 

 many of which, such as his observations of gun-shot 

 wounds, he put to excellent use in later life. On re- 

 turning to England much improved in health in 1763, 

 he entered at once upon his career as a London surgeon, 

 and from that time forward his progress was a practi- 

 cally uninterrupted series of successes in his profession. 



Hunter's work on the study of the lymphatics was 



79 



