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years by an unmarried uncle, who practised as a surgeon and apothecary at Fowey in Cornwall.

From his early years he cherished a taste for the sister-accomplishments of drawing and poetical composition. The pencil and pen now divided his leisure hours. "As my uncle was always averse to my shining," he says in one of his letters, "I used to steal away to an old ruined tower, situate on a rock close by the sea, where many an early and late hour was devoted to the muses.' His studies from nature in painting are stated to have been done in a free and bold style;-displaying a thorough conception of what is great in the art.

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On the expiration of his apprenticeship, Wolcott, as is customary, came to London, where he continued his medical studies in the hospitals, and under the direction of the ablest professors and lecturers of that day. In 1766 Sir William Trelawney, a friend and distant relation of his family, was appointed governor of Jamaica, and, in the following season he carried out young Wolcott with him as his physician. The brief memoir prefixed to Pindar's work alleges that the author obtained his degree of M. D. on his return from Jamaica; but the fact is, that it was conferred upon him by a northern university previous to his leaving England. Soon after his arrival in Jamaica, Dr Wolcott was nominated by his patron physician-general of the island; but it does not appear that this sonorous title was accompanied by a corresponding revenue, or that his private practice as a physician was of a lucrative kind. This accounts for his turning his attention to the church. The il'ness of the rector of St Anne's seems to have been the proximate cause of the Doctor's inclination towards divinity; the living was rich, and Sir William Trelawney was equally willing to promote his interests in the cure of souls as of bodies. It has been said that the bishop of London disappointed his expectations in this line, by refusing him ordination; this is not correct, for he actually took orders and returned to Jamaica, where he found the incumbent of St Anne's restored to health, and where, soon after, his friend the governor died, having been able to do nothing more for our medical clerk than giving him the liv ing of Vere, in which he placed a curate, residing himself at the Government house in Spanish Town. Of the unfitness of Wolcott for the Christian ministry there can be but one opinion. His conversation was stained with the vulgarity of frequent oaths, and he spoke not only lightly but contemptuously of religion.

On the decease of Trelawney he returned home, and established himself as a physician at Truro. The most memorable circumstance connected with his history at this period, is his having discovered the genius of young Opie, under circumstances already related in our notice of that artist. Such was his temper, unfortunately, that few or none of his friendships survived many years. When he broke with Opie, he took Mr Paye, an artist of much promise, under his protection; lodged in his house, advised, and praised him in public. But Paye never rose to be a rival to the discarded Opie, and the connexion between him and Pindar was soon dissolved.

Great success and celebrity attended the first publication under the signature of Peter Pindar; viz. the 'Epistle to those Literary Colossuses the Reviewers,' and the 'Lyric Odes to the Royal Academicians.' The king had been incidentally assailed in these compositions; but the next

lands of Pitcairn went off with a younger son, from whom was descended Dr Archibald Pitcairn, of Pitcairn, justly famed as a physician, poet, wit, scholar, and mathematician. Of the elder branch, the subject of this notice became the representative, upon the death of his uncle, the well-known Dr William Pitcairn, who practised physic in London for nearly half-a-century, and was many years president of the college of physicians.

The subject of the present notice was born on the first of May, 1749, in the house of his grandfather, the Rev. David Pitcairn, minister of Dysart, in Fife. When about nine or ten years old, he was sent to the High-school at Edinburgh, where he remained four years, after which he went to the university of Glasgow, and prosecuted his studies there till he arrived at the age of twenty. At this period of his life he used to spend much of his leisure time with the family of the Rev. James Baillie, minister of Bothwell, in the county of Lanark, and father of the celebrated Dr Matthew Baillie, of London, and Miss Joanna Baillie. During this intercourse commenced an affectionate intimacy between young Pitcairn and Baillie; which afterwards ripened into the warmest friendship. In 1769 Mr Pitcairn went to the university of Edinburgh, and studied medicine there for three years, under the immediate direction of the illustrious Cullen. In 1772 he came to London, and attended the lectures of Dr William Hunter, and Dr G. Fordyce. About the same time also, that he might attain an English degree in physic, though he was then nearly twenty-three years old, he entered at Bennet college, Cambridge. In 1780, several years before he received his doctor's degree, he was elected physician to St Bartholomew's hospital; and about the same time may be dated the commencement of his private medical practice. In 1792 he was chosen physician to Christ's hospital; and in the following year, his private practice being now considerable, he resigned the office of physician to St Bartholomew's hospital. His office at Christ's hospital demanded but little of his time, and was therefore retained by him several years longer.

By the death of Dr Warren, which took place in June, 1797, Dr Pitcairn was placed at the head of his profession in London. One or two other physicians possibly derived as much pecuniary emolument from the practice of medicine as himself, but no other was so frequently requested by his brethren to afford his aid in cases of difficulty. In the autumn of the same year he fell from his horse and bruised his side. Shortly after, his heart began to beat with violence; his attention was more particularly directed to this symptom, as it had occurred in one of his brothers, likewise in consequence of a fall, whose heart after death was found considerably enlarged. He continued, however, to follow his profession till February in the following year, when he was attacked with a hæmorrhage from his lungs. From this he recovered, after some time, so far as to be enabled to resume the exercise of his profession; but the same disease having recurred in summer, he embarked in September for Lisbon. During a stay of more than eighteen months in Portugal, he had no return of the hæmorrhage, in consequence of which he ventured to come back to this country in 1800. He was still feeble, and his heart was still beating too forcibly; for some time, therefore, he declined altogether engaging in medical pracAfterwards, as his health improved, he began to receive patients

at his house; then to meet other physicians in consultation at the houses of their patients; and at length, after an interval of several years, to undertake the entire care of sick persons at their own homes,—except during four months in the latter part of the year, which he spent almost wholly in the country. His health, however, continued feeble, and he died in April, 1809.

His person was tall and erect, but of late years rather thin; his countenance during youth was a model of manly beauty, and even in advanced life was remarkably handsome. He was fond of country

sports and athletic games, particularly the Scottish one named golf. In conversation he shunned dispute. When he dissented from others, he either declared his opinion in a few words, or remained altogether silent. It was a saying of his, says the author of the Gold-headed cane,' that "the last thing a physician learns in the course of his experience, is, to know when to do nothing."

Thomas Beddoes.

BORN A. D. 1760.-DIED A. D. 1809.

THOMAS BEDDOES was born at Shifnal in Shropshire, in the year 1760. His father was a tanner, but determined that his son should receive an excellent education, so as to be fitted for a higher sphere in society. He entered the university of Oxford in 1776. He had previously been placed for two years under the care of Mr Dickerson, a clergyman in Staffordshire, who says of him, "while under my tuition, his mind was so intent upon literary pursuits, chiefly the attainment of classical learning, that I do not recollect his having devoted a single day, or even an hour, to diversions or frivolous amusements of any kind."

After having gained considerable reputation as a classical scholar, and taught himself the French, German, and Italian languages, he commenced studying pneumatic chemistry, "of which," says one of his biographers," he soon became master, as far as it was then known." He subsequently acquired a knowledge of mineralogy and botany. After his death, a manuscript Flora Britannica was found among his papers, which he appears to have written when at Oxford. While there he was accustomed, it is said, to anticipate, as one of the greatest pleasures of manhood, the power of sitting down uncontrolled, and playing whist all day long! Such too was his memory, that after the termination of a game, he could detail the exact order in which, as well as by whom, all the cards had been played.

In 1783 he proceeded master of arts, and in December 1786, obtained the degree of M.D. He repaired to Edinburgh about the year 1784. While there, he attended the lectures of the most famous professors of the day, was noticed as a youth of great promise, and lived in intimacy with the celebrated Dr Brown, whose new system for a while seemed to bear down every thing before it. Sir James Macintosh-who also intended to be a physician, and took a degree for that purpose was one of his contemporaries and friends. It does not appear, however, that the subject of this memoir, at a more mature period of his life, considered the system then prevalent in North Britain as in

capable of being amended; for we find him, but the year before his death, while treating of the melioration of his favourite science, expressing himself as follows:-" However the pupils of Edinburgh may succeed in the world, and fair as it may be for an advocate to avail himself of the fact, I doubt exceedingly whether the public would, if called upor. to act with deliberation, yield its confidence to one of their three years' graduates. In case, for instance, of an election to an hospital, would not the shortness of his standing, and the necessary immaturity of his experience, operate as a fatal objection? Well then! if he is not fit to have pauper-patients committed to him, why should others be allowed to commit themselves? It may be said that a five or six years' graduate would be thought equally incapable of the charge. I believe quite the contrary; provided the electors should have both information and integrity enough to vote according to the merits. It always seems invidious, and in many cases is arrogant in an individual to adduce his opinion of a public body in argument; but as the merits of the Edinburgh school are opposed in this manner to the projected improvement of medical education, those who take a part in the question seem called upon to declare themselves, if they have any probable cause of knowledge. Let me, therefore, briefly state that I went to Edinburgh as an Oxford bachelor of arts, passed there three winters and one summer, was perpetually at the lectures of the professors and in the society of the students. You may think it probable that I have no humiliating associations connected with Edinburgh, if I add that I can never hope to be of so much consequence among my equals any where else, since the students heaped upon me all those distinctions which you know it is in their power to confer. Few individuals, certainly, have ever had a better opportunity of knowing any school. I have seen other schools of medicine, conversed and corresponded much, from that time to the present, with pupils and professors, studied their methods and the productions as well of the youth as of the seniors, so that I cannot accuse myself of having omitted any thing by which I might be enabled to form an opinion concerning this grand question of medical instruction. After comparing, on the spot, the means with the end, I certainly did conceive that a more deliberate process would be preferable, and that a method of instruction, in some other respects materially different, would form physicians far more trustworthy. This opinion, various members of the medical societies could, I dare say, testify that I expressed; and every thing that I have since seen of practice and of literature has tended to confirm it. After a lapse of years, and without the smallest communication, it is satisfactory to find the associated faculty and their correspondents concurring to make it the basis of a legislative measure, and certainly without being actuated by the least ill-will toward any medical school in the universe, I know not whether any impartial person, after seriously reflecting upon the surest way of advancing in so difficult a study, ever surveyed the medical classes at Edinburgh. He would see that perpetual bodily hurry which is generally attended with a good deal of confusion of mind. No sooner does the college hour-bell toll, than the audience rush out in full stream, leaving the last word half finished in the mouth of one professor, not a few fearing lest they should miss the first words of another. Will you call this mere juvenile ardour? The

young men there were generally, and doubtless still are, earnest in their pursuits; but it was a common feeling, that each attempted too much at once; and if it be true, that figures and hues which are to last, must be laid again and again on the mind, with pauses between to allow them to fix, somewhat as in fresco-painting, this feeling would appear to be right. A calculation had been made, and the required attendance distributed as well as possible through the three years. Considering the number of professors, and the necessity for those who were to trust to this school solely, to attend certain courses,-as the anatomical, practical, and clinical,-two or three times; considering, besides, that the merit of out-lecturers will have claims upon the inquisitive, and that many had no other chance for acquiring a smattering of natural philosophy and natural history, how could any student, and especially the most ardent, avoid attempting too much at once? The consequence was too apparent. Our academical architects, in their hurry to finish the structure, failed to lay a solid foundation."

In 1784 he published a translation of Spallanzani's 'Dissertation on Natural History,' of which Sheldon thought so highly, that he never alluded to Spallanzani, without referring his students "to the translation so ably executed by his friend and former pupil." In 1786 we find him acting as reader of chemistry to his Alma Mater. His success at Oxford as a lecturer was unparalleled. "The time of his residence there," says one of his pupils, "was a brilliant one in the annals of the university, and produced a taste for scientific researches that bordered upon enthusiasm."

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In the course of 1787 he visited France, and appears to have been for some time resident at Dijon. While at Paris he of course became acquainted with Lavoisier, whose reputation was at this period at its height, and not only acquired his esteem, but also carried on a scientific correspondence with him after his return. In 1790 he published an analytical account of the writings of Mayow, under the title of Chemical Experiments and Opinions, extracted from a Work published in the Last Century; which did much towards elucidating the opinions of Mayow, and obtaining for his name the fame it merited. In 1791 he contributed to the Transactions of the Royal society a paper on the affinity between basaltes and granite, in which he showed himself to be a zealous volcanist. In the same year he made a mineralogical excursion into Cornwall; on his return through Bath, a lady to whom he was personally unknown, observed to him, "I have heard of Dr Beddoes, that, excepting what he may know about fossils, and such out-ofthe-way things, he is perfectly stupid, and incurably heterodox. Be sides, he is so short and fat, that he might almost do for a show!"

Towards the latter end of 1792 he voluntarily resigned his readership, of which he had been in possession for about six years. After leaving Oxford he had some thoughts of visiting France, but the agitated state of that country prevented him from doing so. "I flattered myself," says he, at this time, "that the tree of despotism was decaying at its roots. But this infernal club of Jacobins, with its mad mob, will water it with innocent blood; it will take fresh root, and put forth new

There was no professorship of chemistry established at that period, nor indeed until 1803, at Oxford; although one had been founded so early as 1706 at Cambridge.

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