1915-16.] Obituary Notices. 343 
When Turner had to choose a medical school he followed Owen’s 
steps to St Bartholomew’s Hospital, and there became intimate with his 
fellow-student George Rolleston, afterwards Linacre Professor of Anatomy 
and Physiology at Oxford. He also made the acquaintance of Sir 
James Paget, of whose character and attainments he ever after spoke 
with admiration. As a student Turner delighted in the theatre, for which 
he showed little inclination after he came to Edinburgh. He was a dis- 
tinguished student, holding a scholarship, and worked for about a year in 
the chemical laboratory in addition to attending lectures and the practical 
class taken by the ordinary medical student. John Stenhouse, LL.D., F.R.S., 
his Professor of Chemistry, writing to Turner when candidate for the 
Chair of Anatomy in 1867, said : “ I may state that Dr Rolleston, now 
Linacre Professor at Oxford, and yourself were by far the ablest and most 
promising pupils I had during the seven years I held the Professorship 
at St Bartholomew’s.” At a lecture, 2nd March 1855, at the Royal Institu- 
tion, on the economical application of charcoal to sanitary purposes, Dr 
Stenhouse stated that the charcoal that had been in contact with two dead 
dogs had been examined by his pupil Mr Turner. Turner’s paper, com- 
municated by Sir James Paget, F.R.S. (received 18th May 1854), on exami- 
nation of the cerebro-spinal fluid, and appearing in the Proceedings of the 
Royal Society of London, was a purely chemical investigation of fluid 
from a case of spina bifida treated by Sir James Paget. Even so late as 
1861 he communicated a chemical paper, “ On the Properties of the Secretion 
of the Human Pancreas,” to the Proceedings of the Royal Society of 
Edinburgh, and one, “ On the Mode of Elimination of the Metal Manganese 
when employed Medically,” to the Edinburgh Medical Journal for April 
— showing that he had not yet abandoned his test tubes. 
Turner told the writer that his intention as a student was to take to 
chemistry, and that he counted on winning a chemical scholarship by ex- 
amination, but that a question was set on agricultural chemistry and he 
was beaten by the son of a farmer. Without the money and the prestige 
of this scholarship he felt that he could not set up as a chemist. While 
under this check the illustrious anatomical philosopher Goodsir appeared 
and took him to become an anatomist, and so changed the direction of his 
life. Professor Goodsir, the premier anatomist of his day, had gone to the 
Riviera on leave of absence from the University of Edinburgh for his 
health, while his class was taken by Dr Struthers, lecturer on anatomy in 
the Edinburgh Extramural School. When he returned in 1854 he found 
that he had no demonstrators. In these circumstances he proceeded to 
London to consult his old friend Professor Sharpey of University College, 
