LIFE AND WHITINGS OF ROBERT WHYTT, M.D. 101 



There are no incidents of his life recorded in the course of his studies ; but 

 among the medical manuscripts in the library of the Edinburgh College of Phy- 

 sicians, there is a book of notes taken by Whytt, from the lectures of George 

 Young, who published, in the year 1758, a " Treatise on Opium." These lec- 

 tures are partly clinical discourses on the cases which occurred in Young's private 

 practice ; partly observations on diseases in general ; partly discussions on the 

 theory of medicine. The manuscript is of considerable extent, and sufficiently 

 curious as a medical antiquity. It was purchased at the sale of Whytt's books 

 after his death, by Dr John Boswell, who had been Whytt's fellow-student 

 under Young, and came into the possession of the College along with a number 

 of books presented by the family of the late Dr Abercrombie. 



Proceeding to London, probably in the year 1734, Whytt became a pupil of 

 Cheselden, while he visited the wards of the London hospitals. Thence, passing 

 over to Paris, he occupied himself with the lectures and dissections of Winslow, 

 and frequented the hospitals La Charite, and the Hotel Dieu. He next went to 

 Leydento hearBoERHAAVE, noAv advanced in years, and his namesake Albinus, still 

 in the prime of life. It is well known that the name of Albinus was Latinised from 

 " White," probably in its German form " Weiss," as Albinus was of German 

 extraction. Had Albinus been a native Dutchman, he might not only have been 

 Whytt's namesake, but of the same lineage ; for, though the Whytts of Fife 

 claim descent from the " Les Blancs" of France, the presumption is far greater 

 that, in common probably with the Whytes of this island in general, they repre- 

 sent the Witts of Friesland, one of whom, Witta the son of Wicte (Vetta 

 VicTi) the grandfather of Hengist and Horsa, according to the probable conclu- 

 sion of Professor Simpson in his very ingenious memoir entitled " The Catstane," 

 lies buried beneath a gigantic monolith of greenstone on the banks of the Almond, 

 but a few miles from Edinburgh. It is not recorded, however, that either the 

 Professor or the pupil recognised in the other any sign of relationship. 



It will come to be considered hereafter whether he then learned from Albinus 

 a particular of the anatomy of the nerves for the assertion of which Whytt's 

 writings were for a long period singular. After six years employed in the study 

 of medicine, he took the degree of Doctor of Medicine at Rheims, in April 1736. 

 At that time, for what reason does not appear, Rheims was much resorted to for 

 degrees in medicine. Rutherford and Porterfield, as well as Whytt, had 

 graduated at Rheims ; while Innes had got his degree at Padua, Sinclair at 

 Angers, and Alston at Glasgow. Of the forty-eight doctors of medicine who 

 became Fellows of the Edinburgh College of Physicians between the beginning of 

 the last century and the time when Whytt was elected a Fellow, sixteen pre- 

 sented the Rheims degree ; yet after that period down to the present, there have 

 been only six, the latest being in the year 1753. The University of Rheims was 

 suppressed at the first French revolution. In the autumn of the year 1737, the 



