APPENDIX. (39) 



Account of 



ton. 



many to the number. While he pradifecl extenfively as a fur- w?H"mii' 

 geon, his fliill in anatomy made him be confulted by many fur- 

 geons, older than himfelf, before they performed operations j 

 and, in a few years, thofe who had been his pupils, praflifing 

 in diflant parts of the country, confulted him on fimilar occa- 

 iions. Befides anatomy, he taught botany and midwifery ; 

 which laft he pradifed with fuch fuccefs, that he was called to 

 almoft every difficult cafe near Glafgow. In Odlober 1783, he 

 married Mifs Elizabeth Stirling, an accompliflied lady, 

 connected with feveral opulent families in Glafgow and its 

 neighbourhood. From thefe connedions, his pradice, already 

 extenfive, was very confiderably increafed. 



Anxjous to excel, not only as a fkilful phylician, and an ex- 

 pert furgeon, but as a public teacher, he was led to conlider 

 every cafe that he treated more accurately than is ufually done 

 by thofe who confine their attention to pradice merely. Though 

 naturally convivial, and endowed with a confiderable degree of 

 his father's humour, he avoided company as much as he could 

 with prudence, and devoted every vacant hour to lludy, and 

 efpecially to writing. He kept a regular account of all uncom- 

 mon cafes, accompanying the conclufion of each with remarks 

 fuggefled at the moment, and forming, at the end of each year, 

 a general table of the difeafes which had prevailed during the 

 different feafons. This plan facilitated his pradice, and was 

 highly gratifying to his patients, by convincing them, that their 

 former complaints were diftindly remembered : But he had a 

 higher objed in view than the aflifling of his own memory, or 

 the gratifying of particular patients. His objed was to have 

 published a Syflem of Surgery, illuflrated with cafes, of which 

 feveral are fully and accurately drawn up. As a fpecimen of 

 what might have been expeded from this work, had he lived to 

 finifh it, I ihall mention a few particulars, which, on account of 



;1 ., their. 



