ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY 



leopards, etc. It is said that for fifteen years he kept 

 a flock of geese for the sole purpose of studying the 

 process of development in eggs. 



Hunter began his first course of lectures in 1772, 

 being forced to do this because he had been so repeat- 

 edly misquoted, and because he felt that he could better 

 gauge his own knowledge in this way. Lecturing was a 

 sore trial to him, as he was extremely diffident, and with- 

 out writing out his lectures in advance he was scarcely 

 able to speak at all. In this he presented a marked 

 contrast to his brother William, who was a fluent and 

 brilliant speaker. Hunter's lectures were at best sim- 

 ple readings of the facts as he had written them, the 

 diffident teacher seldom raising his eyes from his man- 

 uscript and rarely stopping until his complete lecture 

 had been read through. His lectures were, therefore, 

 instructive rather than interesting, as he used infinite 

 care in preparing them ; but appearing before his classes 

 was so dreaded by him that he is said to have been in 

 the habit of taking a half -drachm of laudanum before 

 each lecture to nerve him for the ordeal. One is led 

 to wonder by what name he shall designate that qual- 

 ity of mind that renders a bold and fearless surgeon 

 like Hunter, who is undaunted in the face of hazardous 

 and dangerous operations, a stumbling, halting, and 

 "frightened" speaker before a little band of, at most, 

 thirty young medical students. And yet this same thing 

 is not unfrequently seen among the boldest surgeons. 



Hunter's Operation for the Cure of Aneurisms 



It should be an object-lesson to those who, igno- 

 rantly or otherwise, preach against the painless vivi- 



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