31 
of Edinburgh, Session 1869-70. 
Wardrop attended him. He is understood to have been a great 
favourite with the king ; but, towards the last days of that monarch, 
a misunderstanding at Court arose which excluded Mr Wardrop 
from attendance, in consequence, it was thought, of his having 
complied too frankly with the king’s urgent inquiry as to the 
nature and probable termination of his disease. There can be no 
doubt that Wardrop was right in the opinion he formed, though 
whether the communication he made was consistent with the rules 
of courtly etiquette is not easy to determine. It is, however, be- 
lieved that, from some of those who had been instrumental in 
excluding him from the royal death-bed, Mr Wardrop ultimately 
received an ample apology. Mr Wardrop, though an excellent 
surgeon in all respects, soon showed a special familiarity with 
ophthalmic surgery, and attained the highest reputation in that 
department, both by his writings and his practice. In 1813, Mr 
Wardrop published the well-known case of James Mitchell, the boy 
born blind and deaf, who, I believe, only died in the present year. 
The case excited a great deal of interest both among metaphysicians 
and physiologists. Mr Wardrop’s account of it is extremely in - 
teresting and curious. He had partially succeeded in admitting 
light to the boy’s eye by operating for cataract, and the sight was 
thereby improved, so as to afford the patient the delight that 
colours could convey, and which he keenly enjoyed, though his 
vision still remained too imperfect to become a source by which 
practical information of external objects could be introduced. Mr 
Wardrop was a man of very varied tastes and talents. He had a 
great love and appreciation of art. He was very fond of horses, 
and frequented the hunting-field till a comparatively late age ; 
and it was with great satisfaction that he wrote his essay on 
the diseases of the eye of that animal, which obtained a prize from 
the Board of Agriculture. It has been said that he operated with 
success on several valuable race-horses and hunters by couching 
them for cataract, to the great gratification of their owners ; but 
whether the animals when so treated required a pair of spectacles 
or an artificial lens to supply the place of the extirpated humour, I 
am unable to tell. 
I shall not here attempt any account of Mr Wardrop’s works, 
which must be well known to medical men, who are most likely to 
