MEDICAL STUDIES 239 



to be talked of by his companions, who consequently 

 nicknamed him * Gas ' ; and Dr. Butler, when he heard 

 of them, rebuked the young philosopher, for ' wasting 

 time on such useless subjects/ and called him a <poco 

 curante/ It was evident to his father that further 

 attendance at Shrewsbury School would not advance 

 young Darwin's education, and he was accordingly 

 sent in 1825, when he was a little over sixteen years 

 old, to join his elder brother, who was attending the 

 medical classes of the University of Edinburgh. It 

 was intended that he should begin the study of medi- 

 cine, and qualify himself for that profession ; but he 

 had already discovered that a sufficient competence 

 would eventually come to him to enable him to live 

 in some comfort and independence. So he went to 

 the lectures with no very strong determination to get 

 from them as much good as if he knew that his living 

 was to depend on his success. He found them ' in- 

 tolerably dull/ and records in maturer years his 

 deliberate conviction that c there are no advantages, 

 and many disadvantages, in lectures compared with 

 reading/ That he did not conquer his repugnance 

 to the study of anatomy in particular is remarkable, 

 when we consider how strong already was his love 

 of biology, and how wholly it dominated his later 

 life. Tenderness of nature seems to have had much 

 to do with his repugnance. He could not bear the 

 sight of suffering ; the cases in the clinical wards in 

 the Infirmary distressed him, and after bringing him- 

 self to attend for the first time the operating theatre, 

 he rushed away before the operations were completed 

 and never went back. But he afterwards came to 



