49 
PATHOLOGY. 
The fource from which the profefi’or drew thefe waters 
of fcience was foon difcovered ; each ftudent, being able 
to tafte them at the fountain-head for the moderate fum 
of thirty francs, the price of M. Fodere’s excellent 
Treatife on Medical Jurifprudence, did not hefitaie be¬ 
tween this expenfe and the fatigue of lifteningto tedious 
lectures ; fo that the profefl'or found himfelf abandoned 
by his pupils, and left alone in the vaft amphitheatre of 
the fchools of the faculty. Such a milhap is certainly a 
fufficient apology for M. Royer-Collard’s having given 
fo few leftures in the firft year of his profefTorfhip, and 
for having, during the fucceeding years, renounced all 
public inftruftion. Still-we are indebted to the profelfor 
for the excellent courfe of leftures which his pupils heard 
in the fummer of 1819. As direftor of the Bibliotheque 
Medicale, he infured the fuccefs of the work by contri¬ 
buting the feweft articles to it; as profelfor of medical 
jurifprudence he felt it his duty to refort to limilar means 
to recall his truant pupils, and accomplilhed his objeft 
by employing M. Orfila to lefture for him ; and the fuc¬ 
cefs of the experiment did not detradl from the reputa¬ 
tion of the learned author of the Toxicologie. 
“ Several nominations followed that of this able che- 
mift. M. Beclard was called to the chair of anatomy, 
M. Marjolin to that of external pathology. MM. Fou- 
quier and Roux have alfo been lately appointed ; the firft 
to the chair of the Clinique de Perfeftionnement, vacant 
by the death of M. Bourdier; the latter to a chair of pa¬ 
thology, vacant by the refignation of M. Percy. A-pro- 
pos of this refignation; it is faid in the medical world of 
Paris, that 60,000 francs was the price M. Percy received 
for this profelforlhip ; certainly a large fura for a place, 
the receipts and prefervation of which are not certain. 
The cafe is not without precedent; at Montpellier in 
1786, M. de Barthez fold a profeffor’s chair to M. Gri- 
maud for 30,000 francs. This is great authority for the 
venality of profeflorfhips; which, however, has one little 
inconvenience, i. e. that of excluding the poor man of 
talent, though it prefents the inappreciable advantage of 
narrowing the field of favour, a divinity more to be feared 
than riches. Still we cannot complain of fimilar bar¬ 
gains, when they bring fuch men as M. Roux into a 
more extended fphere of ufefulnefs. This excellent fur- 
geon and learned profelfor muft always have appeared to 
advantage in a concurrence with any rivals. 
“Since the fupprellion of the concours , the faculty of 
medicine prefents to the choice of the committee of pub¬ 
lic inftruftion four candidates. The three laft are, how¬ 
ever, only infcribed for form’s fake. This fort of eleftion 
is not at all approved by the faculty, who accordingly, 
in 1818, unanimoully demanded that the vacant profefl'or- 
ftiips fhould be given by the concours. The committee 
of public inftruftion refufed to accede to this requeft ; 
and, to avoid all difcufiion with the faculty, refolved to 
choofe the firft of the candidates named. It was there¬ 
fore without any chance of fuccefs, that MM. Hulfon, 
R6camier, and Parifet, were joined candidates with M. 
Fouquier. 
“ You have not forgotten that M. Parifet left Paris, 
by order of the minilter of the interior, to obferve the 
yellow fever which raged at Cadiz, with great violence, 
in the fummer of 1819. In Europe, as well as in the 
tropics, this difeafe always difappears on the firft ap¬ 
proach of winter; a little trifling fa ft, of which M. De¬ 
cazes ought to have been aware before he put the ftate 
to fuch an expenfe. As M. Parifet was ftill at Madrid 
on the 23d of November, it is clear that he could not 
make obfervations on a difeafe which had already difap- 
peared from Cadiz. The only fubjefts for examination 
would be convalefcents, who are perhaps as fit to give 
an idea of the charafter of a difeafe as a few ftragglers to 
convey an appropriate impreflion of the nature and 
ftrength of an army. If M. Parifet had departed three 
months earlier, he might have given us the refult of his 
Vop. XIX No. 1286. 
own obfervations; as it is, we fhall only now have the 
opinions of the Spanifti phyficians, which could have 
as well been tranfmitted by the poll. As yet the fruits 
of fuch an expenfive journey are confined to four co¬ 
loured engravings, publifhed by M. Parifet, which, an¬ 
nounced at a moment when all eyes were direfted to 
Cadiz, excited great curiofity. We expefted at lead 
portraits of Quiroga, Riego, plans of the fortifications 
of La Ifla, and the redoubts of La Cortadura. It was a 
cruel difappointment for the curious to find three faces 
of men dying of the yellow fever, and fourteen tongues ; 
not tongues of eloquence and fire, but the dirty tongues 
of patients announcing to the eye and finger the ftate of 
the inteftinal canal; and which are intended by M. 
Parifet to exprefs the different phafes of the yellow fever 
in fuccefflon. You will be furprifed at this. Why ? 
Since w'e clafs and defcribe difeafes by the fame method 
which botanifts employ to clafs and defcribe plants, it 
is natural that we fhould endeavour to determine the 
charafters of the former, by the aid of drawings. M. 
Parifet, indeed, muft view difeafes as enjoying great ad¬ 
vantages in this refpeft ; for Linnaeus affirms that the 
colour of the corolla is too variable a quality to deter¬ 
mine the diftinftion of vegetables; and our learned 
traveller confiders the colour of the face and tongue as 
cbarafteriftic of difeafes, in which the expreflion and co¬ 
lour of the face change from minute to minute. 
“ M. Gall has commenced his annual courfe of crn- 
niology in the amphitheatre in the Rue St. Viftor. This 
fcience is getting Angularly out of fafhion. Time w'as 
when M. Gall made us pay high enough for his leftures, 
and w'e had difficulty to fight our way to the door. Now 
we enter gratis, and there is plenty of room. When M. 
Decazes was minifter of police, he greatly encouraged the 
fcience of craniology, by giving its inventor a penlion of 
3000 francs. M. Decazes undoubtedly found the fcience 
ufeful inchoofing his counfellors ; and, if this minifter’s 
reign had continued, the late preventive laws would 
have been founded on craniological principles. 
“A fubjeft which has more reality and praftical appli¬ 
cation, is the excellent courfe of human anatomy which 
M. Beclard gives to the faculty of medicine. M. Dumeril 
had already greatly advanced the ftudy of this department 
of anatomy, confidered in a philofophical point of view. 
Some indeed thought that he too frequently introduced 
the fubjeft of comparative anatomy. M. Beclard is more 
referved on this point; but the compofition and analogies 
of textures, the forms and relations of parts, both in a 
ftate of health and difeafe, fuggeft to him at every ftep a 
variety of interefting general obfervations, w'hich en¬ 
liven the drynefs of anatomical difcufiion, and are almoft 
all of praftical application. M. Beclard, before he be¬ 
came profefl'or, underwent the probationary trials, as 
“ chef des travaux anatomiques.” MM. Dumeril and 
Dupuytren occupied this honourable poft before him. 
M. Brefchet now'fills it in a manner which will foon place 
him on the diftinguifhed level of his predeceffors. M. 
Chauffier ftill teaches phyfiology, and gives two leftures 
a-week. This learned teacher always difplays the fame 
profound views, and the fame originality of ideas. He 
ftill preferves his prejudices again ft the acceflary lciences, 
which he calls “ftrangers to medicine,” and againft che¬ 
mical explanations of phenomena, w'hich he ftyles chi¬ 
merical. 
“Since Profefl'or Cuvier has become a ftatefman, and 
fcience is only the amufement of his leifure hours, there 
are no other leftures on comparative anatomy at Paris, 
but thofe given by M. de Blainville, at the Faculte des 
Sciences. They are very well attended, and would he 
more fo if the theatre of the College de Pleffis were larger. 
M. de Blainville, as a favant and profelfor, promifes to 
be a worthy fuccefl'or of his mafter Cuvier, wffiom w'e 
truft he will follow in his Linnsean zeal for the fcience 
of nature 3 but we hope he will not imitate him in thofe 
O pretenfions 
