3l6 PHILOSOPHICAL TKANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1747. 



a greater certainty of its mineral origin. As for that marine body the alveolus, 

 he thinks it is of the nautilus kind; and which, at the concretion or formation of 

 the belemnites, became accidentally lodged in its cavity, in the same manner as 

 all other marine bodies became lodged in the various fossil substances they are 

 now found in. 



On the Indian Poison, sent over by Don Antonio De Ulloa of Seville, F. R.S. 

 and mentioned by M. De La Condamine, Member of the Rotjal Academy of 

 Sciences at Paris, in his late Account of the River oftlve Amazons; bein"- a 

 Letter from Richard Brochlesby,* M.D., F.R.S. N" 482, p. 408. 

 On hearing lately part of Don Antonio de Ulloa's-|- letter to the president. Dr. B. 



was suspicious M. de la Condamine had taken some facts there on the authority 



• Dr. Brocklesby was distinguished not only for his skill and humanity in the exercise of his profes- 

 sion, and for his medical publications, but also for being the associate and friend of 2 memorable po- 

 litical characters, Wilkes and Burke, as well as of the celebrated critical and moral writer Dr. Samuel 

 Johnson. He was born at Minehead in Somersetshire, 1722, and three years after was taken over 

 to Ireland, where he received his grammatical education, after which he went to study physic, first 

 at Edinburgh and next at Leyden, at which last university he took his degree of m. d. in 1745, He 

 afterwards came to London, and in 1751 was admitted a licentiate of the College of Physicians. In 

 1754- he obtained an honorary degree from Dublin, and a similar honour was conferred upon him the 

 same year by the university of Cambridge. In 1 756 he was admitted a fellow of the London College 

 of Physicians, and in 1758 he was appointed physician to the army, and served in that capacity in 

 Germany, during the greater part of the 7 years war. He was afterwards made physician to the 

 hospitals for British forces. On the conclusion of the war he returned to London, and acquired con- 

 siderable reputation and emolument by his practice. He died in 1797. at the advanced age of 75. 



Besides his inaugural dissertation, and the Harveian oration which he pronounced before the Col- 

 lege of Physicians, he wrote an Essay on the Mortality among horned Cattle, a Dissert, on the Music 

 of the Ancients, and several medical papers inserted in the Phil. Trans. ; but his principal work is that 

 which is entitled QEconomical and Medical Observations in 1 vol. 8vo. This book contains many ex- 

 cellent practical remarks concerning the history and treatment of various disorders, with some useful 

 hints relative to the management of hospitals, being the result of his experience while he served as 

 physician to the army. 



Dr. B. was respectable for his professional abilities, but still more so for his truly benevolent dispo- 

 sition. He not only gave advice gratis to the poor, but granted annuities to several widows who had 

 been left necessitous ; not to mention his liberal offers to Dr. Johnson, and his liberal donation to his 

 friend Mr. Burke. The reader will participate with the biographer in emotions of the most pleasing 

 kind, on the mention of such rare instances of exalted friendship and benevolence. 



t This gentleman was one of those sent by the king of Spain to attend and assist the French astro- 

 nomers of the Royal Academy of Sciences, in their late measure of a degree of latitude near the equa- 

 tor. He was taken prisoner at Cape Breton in his return home, and brought into Englandj where 

 his papers all relating to the measure of the degree, and other astronomical and philosophical obser- 

 vations, were by favour of the lords commissioners of the Admiralty restored to him, to be published 

 in his own country. An abstract of the same was however, by their lordships' leave, communicated 

 to the Royal Society, by their president, who was entrusted with the perusal of the same : and the 

 author himself, who is a gentleman of great merit, was soon after unanimously chosen a Fellow of 



