Place of Dr. Meltzer in American Medicine. 39 



science, experimental physiology by laboratory methods. There 

 have been physicians, especially in their younger and lean years, 

 with scientific inclinations who have done excellent work in the 

 laboratory but only for a time; ultimately they were practitioners- 

 There have been practitioners, as for example S. Weir Mitchell, 

 who have continued to be interested in experimental work, but 

 after all they are not comparable to Dr. Meltzer, who combined 

 in an extraordinary manner the life of the practitioner and the 

 life of the real specialist in experimental physiology. It is worth 

 pausing to consider this because it is a remarkable phenemenon. 

 Meltzer must have exerted no little restraint not to allow himself 

 to become so immersed in practice as to cause him to withdraw 

 from his scientific activities. 



The first ten years after his arrival were years in which he 

 produced something nearly every year. There were some years, 

 1884-85-86, of relatively little productivity. In general the 

 period from 1883 to the early nineties of the last century was one 

 in which he was establishing himself in a comfortable practice; he 

 desired no more. He had to make his livelihood and this was the 

 only congenial way open to him, but he did not allow himself, 

 even during these early years, to be withdrawn from scientific 

 interests and work. It shows a remarkable loyalty to an ideal and 

 a very extraordinary enthusiasm and tenacity of purpose to have 

 accomplished this under conditions apparently so adverse. Once 

 established in a comfortable practice, his scientific interests bore 

 upon his practice and his practice bore upon the character of his 

 scientific progress, as has been already pointed out. 



Dr. Howell has given us an admirable characterization of 

 Meltzer as the experimental physiologist who occupies by prefer- 

 ence that border land between laboratory and practice, a type 

 quite incomprehensible to the ordinary practitioner. 



Meltzer was one of the few earlier physicians in this country 

 whose practice was based upon physiological training, aptitude and 

 interest. S. Weir Mitchell was another, although his interests 

 became mainly clinical. If Dr. Graham Lusk had not already re- 

 ferred to it, I was going to speak of his father also, as another man 

 who, in his special field of obstetrics, founded upon physiological 

 study and interest, made admirable the work of the scientific 

 practitioner in this field. 



