Bevieics — Life of Sir Richard Oicen. 39 



Prof. Owen and his wife, more especially from that of the latter, 

 who, it appears, kept a most exhaustive account of all Owen's doings 

 and work. It is delightful to notice what deep interest she took in 

 all his researches, and how carefully she recorded their progress; and 

 the fact that she did not complain even when the house was occupied 

 by a defunct Ehinoceros or portion of an Elephant sufficiently hung 

 to necessitate keeping all the windows open, shows that she was 

 a most sympathetic wife for a scientific man. 



Vol. I. commences with Owen's ancestry, and his early training at 

 school and at home ; his letters to and from his mother and sisters 

 show what a lovable man he was. It is amusing to read of his having 

 been stigmatized while at school as "lazy and impudent": what 

 would that master think of his forecast if he could read these 

 volumes ? We find an interesting account of his early taste for 

 ethnology in his adventure with the negro's head (page 23) during 

 his apprenticeship to a surgeon at Lancaster. But it was not until 

 he went to Edinburgh, where he founded the Hunterian Society, that 

 his scientific inclinations were really manifested. From Edinburgh, 

 acting on the advice of Barclay, he came to London to study at 

 St. Bartholomew's under Abernethy, and it was owing to the 

 recommendation of the latter that he was appointed Assistant 

 Curator of the Hunterian Collection at the Koyal College of 

 Surgeons. 



It is from this date (1826) that Owen's career as a scientific man 

 commenced, and the greater part of Vol. I. is devoted to his life at 

 the College of Surgeons. This is, perhaps, the most interesting 

 part of the work, for we are able to trace how he gradually weaned 

 himself from medicine and devoted himself more and more to 

 comparative anatomy, due in the first place to the nature of his 

 work, and also, probably, in a large manner to the unconscious 

 influence of the great scientists with whom he came in contact. One 

 of the earliest of these was Cuvier, who visited the College and 

 invited Owen in return to Paris. His biographers evidently consider 

 that the supposed influence of Cuvier on Owen's future work has 

 been overestimated, but, as Huxley points out, Cuvier's work stands 

 out so pre-eminently when compared with that of his contemporaries 

 that it must have had considerable influence in directing the method 

 of work of a young aspiring anatomist such as Owen then was, and 

 the mere fact that no reference of such influence is recorded in 

 Owen's diary goes for nothing. 



It is perfectly marvellous to note the amount of energy which 

 Owen must have possessed, for we read of his working all day at 

 his catalogues, his dissections, his lectures, and his duties on various 

 Commissions, then winding up the day with theatres or concerts, 

 and commencing the next by sitting up to write scientific papers 

 or, sad to relate ! to consume novels. 



During the thirty years of his connection with the College of 

 Surgeons, the most important of Owen's scientific work was done ; 

 and we are here able to read of the rapid growth of his now world- 

 wide reputation as an Anatomist and a Palaeontologist. Here, too, 



