Sir James Young Simpson and Chloroform (1811-1870) Part 6

For what are all our contrivings, And the wisdom of our books, When compared with your caresses And the gladness of your looks."

His affectionate disposition and kindly manner gained the devotion of his many child patients; and his own family bereavements made him a sympathetic physician and friend to many a sorrowing mother. There was no cant or affectation in his sympathy; it grew out of his large heart.

Animals also he was fond of and gentle to, as we know from the history of the dogs who successively reigned in the household, so charmingly given to us by his daughter. One episode in the life of Puck, a black and tan terrier more intelligent than "breedy," deserves repet.i.tion.

The dog had accompanied the Professor and some of his children into the country one afternoon on an expedition to dig for antiquarian relics. "After tea Puck, seeing every one carrying something to the station, demanded the honour of relieving his master of a _Lancet_, and went off with his small burden looking very important.... At the station the dog was missing. All got into their places but Puck. 'I will follow in the next train,' said the Professor; 'Puck is too dear a little friend to lose....' All he found of Puck was a muddy _Lancet_, and the last that had been seen of the old dog was that he was pushing his way through a crowd of idle colliers, where it was supposed his energies had been so engrossed in guarding the _Lancet_ that he had lost sight of his party.... His master stayed there until next morning, and some remembered afterwards how Puck's loss gave them another evening's talk with one they loved, though he broke in on the reminiscences with 'I wonder where little Puck is,' or 'Is that his bark?' No Puck came to demand entrance, and hope of his return was given up after three days pa.s.sing without news of him. His master was thinking of the sorrowful letter he would have to write to Puck's companions when late one night, as he paced wearily up and down the room, he thought he heard a faint bark. There had been a great deal of listening of late for the little dog's bark; but it seemed vain to think of Puck's retracing his steps through an unknown country for so many miles. Still the Professor opened the door and called. Up the area steps something did limp into the hall. That it was Puck seemed doubtful at first, for he was quick and bright, and this animal was a lame ball of mud hardly able to crawl. The bright eyes, however, were Puck's; and he confirmed his ident.i.ty by exerting his remaining energies to give one leap gratefully to kiss the friendly face that bent over him.... His truant play-fellows received a long letter from their father telling them of Puck's adventure and imagining Puck's feelings and trials through his long wanderings.... That letter always recalls Puck and his never-resting master bending over his desk, despite press of business, to send the news to Puck's companions."

Simpson looked no further than his own nursery and circle of close friends for the refreshment and recreation which nature demanded in the course of his busy daily life. But holidays were necessary sometimes. He exhibited all the aversion of an enthusiastically busy man to leaving his work, but would yield sometimes to the solicitations of friends and would more readily leave his patients for a time if a prospect was held out of some interesting archaeological research to be indulged in. In 1850 he suffered from an abscess, caused by blood-poisoning contracted during professional work. At the request of his friends Professor Syme was called in, somewhat to the chagrin of Simpson's old friend and colleague, Miller. It is interesting to note that in spite of the recent controversy on anaesthetics, Montgomery of Dublin, who had keenly opposed him, was amongst the first to write a sympathetic note on hearing of his illness; although dissenting from some of Simpson's professional utterances, Montgomery was influenced by the Professor's personality to respect him as a man and a worker.

After this illness Simpson took a rapid run round the Continent, visiting those cities where anything professional was to be picked up.

As he expressed it himself he "scampered" round the Universities, Museums, and Hospitals, seeing and hearing all that was to be seen and heard. He stowed away the newly acquired knowledge in the recesses of his mighty brain, and hastened on to the next place of interest before his companions had gained their breath sufficiently to regard with intelligent interest the objects he had already left behind. In Paris, on the occasion of one of his flying visits into a hospital, he was present at an operation, unknown to the surgeon, in which chloroform was used not only as a preventive of pain, but also for its remedial effect; after the operation the surgeon addressed his students upon the subject of chloroform, and Simpson had the pleasure of listening to a hearty eulogy of it. When, at the end, he handed in his card, the operator's delight was genuine and effusive, and the students enthusiastically appreciated the somewhat dramatic scene. On such occasions when he had to submit to the embraces of delighted foreign scientists, the exuberant manner in which they kissed him was not to his liking; even the remote strain of French blood in his own veins did not help him to enjoy the Continental mode of salutation. All over Europe his name was honoured and revered. It is said that when in later years an Edinburgh citizen was presented at the Court of Denmark the King remarked, "You come from Edinburgh? Ah! Sir Simpson was of Edinburgh!"

The last trip to the Continent, indeed his last real holiday, was taken in 1868, when he ran over to Rome. So public was the life he led, such matters of interest to his fellow-countrymen were his comings and goings, that the _Scotsman_ newspaper chronicled his doings, relating the sights and places of interest which he visited, and noting that his professional services were taken advantage of by many Roman citizens during the few days that he was there; and that if time had permitted a public reception would have been given to him. In all his foreign trips his object was to learn, not to teach; he followed Sir Isaac Newton's advice to Ashton, and let his discourse be more in queries than in a.s.sertions or disputings. He took care neither to seem much wiser nor much more ignorant than his company.

Sometimes feeling the need of rest himself he would take one or perhaps three days for a rapid run to the Lakes, or would spend another in the country unearthing some antiquarian object. It was always a pleasure to him to visit Bathgate, where his uncle and friend Alexander had latterly resigned the baker's business and taken up the _role_ of banker. One of his favourite resorts was a small house called Viewbank which he had taken, situated on the sh.o.r.es of the Firth of Forth. Here he was close to the fishing village of Newhaven; the fisher folks--the men and the picturesquely attired "fish-wives"--a st.u.r.dy and original set of people, were a great interest to him. They knew him well both as an occasional visitor and as the good physician.

One of his letters written in 1856 gives an indication of the wide area over which his services were requisitioned and rendered.

"_Sunday._

"I write this at Viewbank, which is very pretty this afternoon, but where I have not been for a week or more. This year I have not yet had one single holiday, and scarcely expect one now. I have had many long runs during the past few months. I have been often up in England, professionally, during the summer; once as far as Brighton seeing a consumptive case; once at Scarboro' where my wife went with me; once or twice in London where I saw the Queen; once at Ambleside. I long and weary for a _real_ jaunt without a sick patient lying at the end of it. And I had a great fancy to run from Manchester to Douglas and send all the patients far enough; I have been too hard worked to write, but I _must_ write one or two papers now. Queen Street has been a little hotel during the summer--always some sick lady or another sleeping in it, sometimes several at night."

Even on these professional journeys he found time to examine objects of interest in the neighbourhood; or if he was unable to leave the immediate proximity of his patient, he brought pen and paper to the bedside and worked while he waited; thus he economised time as he advised his students always to do. It is doubtful if any one less great than Simpson would have ever been allowed to labour thus by a sufferer's bedside; indeed even he was not always permitted to do so.

It is recorded that, at least, one lady rose hastily and seized his pen so that he was obliged to desist.

The striking form with which Nature had endowed him, became more remarkable when affected by years, work, and domestic afflictions.

Though of medium height his presence, even beside typically large-built and large-boned fellow-countrymen, was never insignificant. His features, overhung by his ma.s.sive forehead, surrounded by the long and thick hair, spoke his character. Firm, concentrated mouth and piercing eyes, when his mind was fixed on a scientific or practical object. A soft, womanly tenderness about the lips, and a genial, sympathetic emotion in his deep-set eyes when aroused by an object of pity or pleasure. His hand was "broad and powerful, but the fingers were pointed and specially sensitive of touch." To see him was to see one of the sights of the modern Athens. His features are familiar to us to-day as one of the ring of brilliant, intellectual faces forming a frame to the picture of Queen Victoria in this the year of her Diamond Jubilee--a year of triumphant retrospection, unprecedented in the history of nations.

It was impossible that a man holding Simpson's position, engaged in his work, and possessed of distinct fighting characteristics, should not make enemies. He could say, as Jenner said before him, "As for fame, what is it? A gilded b.u.t.t for ever pierced by the arrows of malignancy. The name of John Hunter stamps this observation with the signature of truth."

The arrows of malignancy did not hurt Simpson. He was very little, if at all, affected by them; but he paid, perhaps, more attention to them than we might have expected him to pay; certainly more than they deserved. His love of the fray led him oftentimes to answer what had better have been left unnoticed, and dragged him into prolonged, sometimes bitter, and, it is to be regretted, often unworthy, controversies. There was so much valuable work to be done, and his efforts were always so fruitful in result that we grudge the time spent in these squabbles; there arises an instinctive feeling that had he devoted the energy wasted in these contests to furthering some single branch of science, he would have made distinct advances therein. There was nothing superficial about his work; whatever the object it was thoroughly entered into; his writings convey to one a sense of the power he had of seeing all round and through a question, and of weighing and judging evidence. There was likewise no scamping in his mode of treating his opponents in these squabbles; he used his weapons fearlessly and administered many a trouncing to weak opponents.

It was a time of upheaval in things medical. The microscope and stethoscope had been introduced into the science and practice of the healing art. Scientific experiment and research were beginning to lay the foundations of rational medicine and surgery. Edinburgh was in the front rank of modern progress, as she has ever been. Men like Simpson, Syme, Miller, Alison, and Christison, were not likely to lag behind.

But, unfortunately, it was equally unlikely that such great minds could all think alike in matters concerning the principles of the science and art which they taught and practised. Thus it happened that the Edinburgh School became notorious for its internal quarrels, and in these Simpson was, as a rule, to be found busy.

Quite apart from these professional differences were the disputes arising from attacks made upon Simpson by professional brethren and laymen, who accused him of wrong treatment or neglect of patients. His fame endowed him with almost superhuman powers in the minds of patients and their friends. When all other means had failed Simpson was hastened to as a last but sure resource; bitter the disappointment, bitter was the grief, and also sometimes bitter the things said of him when the anxious friends of a sufferer found that even Simpson's powers of healing were limited. These attacks were some of the "arrows of malignancy," which naturally fell about the over-busy man. He thought it necessary to stop, pick up these arrows, and challenge the a.s.sailants; we may regret that he stooped so often to this action, but we feel that it sprang as much from the love of truth and justice as from the dictates of a disposition inclined towards quarrel.

It is impossible to pa.s.s over the great controversy which raged in Edinburgh about 1850 on the merits of h.o.m.oeopathy, in which Simpson, of course, took a leading part. About the beginning of the century the practice of medicine by the apothecaries, as the general pract.i.tioners were then called, consisted in the most unscientific, nay, haphazard administration of drugs in large quant.i.ties and combinations. It was an age of drugging doctors, and the custom had become so thoroughly established that it is doubtful whether any less completely opposite system than that introduced by Hahnemann would have convinced the public that after all so many drugs were not required, nor such large quant.i.ties of them. h.o.m.oeopathic practice was founded on facts improperly interpreted, and laid down for general use a procedure that was applicable in only a limited number of cases. As Dr. Lauder Brunton has recently pointed out, it is in many instances only a method of faith-cure, and as such has its value. The success which its pract.i.tioners certainly obtained in many cases where the ordinary wholesale drugging of the day had proved futile, at once made men pause ere allowing their bodies to be made receptacles for the complicated preparations of the physician. In Edinburgh at this time the influence of h.o.m.oeopathy had been felt. Alison, a physician of great renown, was to the end a p.r.o.nounced polypharmacist, and was said scarcely ever to leave a patient without a new bottle or prescription.

Graham, another university professor, was also a thorough-going old school therapeutist. On the other hand, Syme treated all medicine except rhubarb and soda with disdain; and Henderson, the professor of Pathology, and also a practising physician, after professing to consider no medicine of very much value, became a p.r.o.nounced sceptic, and finally horrified his colleagues by making trials of h.o.m.oeopathy, and gradually becoming enamoured of it until he confessed himself a full follower of Hahnemann's doctrines. Christison was leading the school which urged that the action of medicines should be studied experimentally if their administration was to be founded on scientific grounds. The behaviour of Henderson, who so greatly owed his position as professor to Simpson, stirred the wrath of the latter. He examined and condemned the irrational system of Hahnemann, and threw himself into an att.i.tude of strong opposition. Syme and Christison ably seconded him in strong public action. Henderson was obliged to resign his chair owing to "loss of health." h.o.m.oeopathy was thoroughly crushed in Edinburgh. The contest between the old system of drugging with large complicated doses of powerful remedies, and the new one of giving on principle infinitesimal doses of the same medicines, served a good purpose. It gave an opportunity for establishing rational therapeutics, a science which is making daily progress, and in the presence of which neither the old system nor h.o.m.oeopathy can stand.

About this same period mesmerism was again coming to the front, this time cloaked as a science termed electro-biology. Simpson acknowledged that there was a great deal in mesmerism demanding scientific investigation; but with his reasoning powers he could not realise the existence of the mystically-termed higher phenomena of animal magnetism, _e.g._, lucidity, transference of the senses, and, above all, clairvoyance. It happened that a professional mesmerist gave a performance in Edinburgh; learning that the "professor's" daughter was stated to be able to read anything written on paper, or to divine any object enclosed in a sealed box while under her father's mesmeric power, Simpson attended the performance. He took with him a specially-prepared test--a sealed box with certain unknown contents; this he presented at a suitable opportunity. Against their own wishes, but on the insistence of the audience, the performers made an attempt by their methods to detect the nature of the contents of this test-box. They p.r.o.nounced it to be money; on opening it millet seed was found, and a piece of paper, on which was written, "humbug."

An accusation, couched in bitter terms, that Simpson was really a supporter of mesmerism as it was then known, was published in one of the leading professional journals in London. He indignantly repudiated the suggestion and proposed to settle the matter finally by a simple expedient. He offered to place five sealed boxes each containing a line from Shakspeare written by himself on paper, in the hands of the editor of the journal who had permitted the attack to appear in his columns. To any clairvoyant who read these lines according to the professed method, and to the satisfaction of a committee of eminent medical men, he promised the sum of five hundred pounds. The offer, however, was not accepted.

The brilliant attainments of many of its teachers at this period not only placed the Edinburgh school at the head of the British schools of medicine, but also led to tempting offers being made to individual professors by rival schools anxious to secure their services.

London was a much more lucrative field for practice than the Scots metropolis, and several of the most eminent Edinburgh men had from time to time yielded to the temptation to migrate southwards. Indeed, London as a medical school owes a great deal to the Scotsmen whom she imported. Liston had left for London in 1834, and Syme followed, for a brief period, on Liston's death. In 1848 a strong effort was made to secure Simpson as a lecturer on midwifery at St. Bartholomew's Hospital; without any hesitation he decided to remain in the city where he had fought his way to fame, and where he enjoyed popularity, and a practice sufficiently lucrative to satisfy the most ambitious man. Every patriotic Scot applauded the decision.

During these years of fame and prosperity Simpson concerned himself in schemes for the improvement of the surroundings of the working cla.s.ses, and helped with speech and purse those who worked among the poor. He strongly supported the establishment of improved dwellings for workpeople and gave much attention to the subject of Cottage Hospitals. He did not neglect the poor amongst whom he had laboured in his early days. He loved old Edinburgh, and the poor inhabitants of it were near his heart. "The Professor" was known in many a "wynd" and "stair," where his services were rendered willingly and without reward.

CHAPTER IX

ARCHaeOLOGY--PRACTICE

His versatility--The Lycium of the Muses--The Catstane--Was the Roman Army provided with medical officers?--Weems--His lack of business method--Fees and no fees--Generosity often imposed upon--His unusual method of conducting private practice--The ten-pound note--Simpson and the hotel proprietors.

Professor Simpson's versatility was remarkable. He turned from one subject to another and displayed a mastery over each; it was not merely the knowledge of principles which astonished but the intimate familiarity with details. He was able to discuss almost any subject in literature, science, politics, or theology with its leading exponent on equal terms. He had the power of patient listening as well as the gift of speech; more than that he had the ability to charm speech from others, of making each man reveal his inmost thoughts, betray his most cherished theories, or narrate his most stirring experiences; the most reticent man would not realise until he had left Simpson's presence, that in a brief interview, perhaps the first, he had told his greatest adventures, or laid bare his wildest aspirations before this student of mankind who was summarising his life and character as he spoke.

Simpson built up his knowledge not so much from books as by the exercise of his highly developed faculty of observation aided by his memory. He enjoyed the study of his fellowmen and extracted all that was worth knowing from those with whom he came into contact. He never undertook work without a definite object in view, and rarely abandoned his task before that object was accomplished. Quite small researches would lead to considerable and unexpected labour. He preserved his scientific method, his desire to appeal only to the evidence of facts--not to other men's fancies--through his archaeological work as well as in more professional lines of study. He laboured long and carefully over such an object as the study of old skulls dug up in antiquarian excursions; setting before himself the object of finding out by the condition and wear of the teeth what kind of food had been consumed by the owners, probably primeval inhabitants of some district. He impressed his methods upon those who worked for him or with him. We find him writing to his nephew, who was about to visit Egypt, telling him when there to gather information as to the suitability of the country for invalids, and directing him how to employ his leisure in furthering this object. He was to study German on the voyage thither, and to take with him as models Clarke's book on Climate and Mitch.e.l.l's on Algiers, and any French or German books on the subject he might hear of. He would require to collect (1) The average daily temperature; (2) The hygrometric and barometric states daily; (3) The temperature of the Nile; (4) The temperature of any mineral springs; (5) The general character of the geology; (6) The general character of the botany of the country. He asked him to inquire specially as to the effect of the climate on consumption, and pointed out that Pliny described Egypt seventeen centuries ago as the best climate for phthisical patients. For amus.e.m.e.nt he was to take some good general book on Egypt and Egyptian hieroglyphics. The serious study of a succession of inquirers was to be the young man's holiday amus.e.m.e.nt!

Simpson's most notable contributions to archaeology were made when his time was most occupied professionally. The researches on Leprosy were first enlarged and improved. In 1852, when in the British Museum, his eye was attracted by a small leaden vase bearing a Greek inscription signifying the _Lycium of the Muses_. By a painstaking inquiry he established that this lycium was the _Lykion indikon_ of Dioscorides, drug used by ancient Greeks as an application to the eyes in various kinds of ophthalmia. It was obtained from India, and is still used for these purposes in that country. He discovered that there were three other examples of this ancient receptable for the valued eye-medicine in modern museums.

He had correspondents in different parts of Scotland engaged in making researches into antiquities, which he encouraged and directed. Among such were inquiries into the whereabouts of a church said to possess holy earth brought from Rome; and a hunt for ancient cupping-vessels.

The work on the Catstane of Kirkliston was elaborate, and a perfect example of his method. Probably this stone, a ma.s.sive unhewn block of greenstone-trap, had been a familiar object to him in his youth, for it lay alone in a field close to the Linlithgow road. In his monograph he endeavoured to show by close reasoning, with profuse references to forgotten authorities and ancient history, that the stone was the tomb of one Vetta, the grandfather of Hengist and Horsa. His argument ran as follows: The surname Vetta, which figured on the inscription carved upon the stone, was the name of the grandfather of Hengist and Horsa, as given by the oldest genealogists, who described him as the son of Victa. The inscription ran thus: VETTA F(ilius) VICTI. Vetta was an uncommon Saxon name, and no other Vetta, son of Victa, was known in history. Two generations before Hengist and Horsa arrived in England a Saxon host was leagued with the Picts, Scots, and Attacots in fighting a Roman army, and these Saxons were probably commanded by an ancestor of Hengist and Horsa. The battlefield was situated between the two Roman walls, and consequently included the tract where the stone is now placed. The palaeographic characters of the inscription indicated that it was carved about the end of the fourth century. Latin (with a very few exceptions in Greek) was the only language known to have been used at that time by Romanised Britons and foreign conquerors for the purpose of inscriptions. The occasional erection of monuments to Saxon leaders is proved by the fact mentioned by Bede that in his time, the eighth century, there stood in Kent a monument commemorating the death of Horsa. In 1659 a writer had described this tomb of Horsa as having been destroyed by "storms and tempests under the conduct of time."

In 1861 Simpson was president of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and delivered an address on the past and present work of archaeology which greatly stimulated antiquarian study in his country.

Amongst the honours which his antiquarian achievements brought upon him was that of being appointed Professor of Antiquities to the Royal Academy of Scotland; he was also elected a member of the Archaeological Societies of Athens, Na.s.sau, and Copenhagen.

He made researches into the subjects of lake dwellings, primeval pottery, and burial urns. One of his most valuable writings was upon the subject, "Was the Roman Army provided with Medical Officers?" He answered the question in the affirmative after a laborious hunt amongst votive and mortuary tablets; no Roman historians had left clear indications of the existence of any army medical department. He found that several tablets were preserved bearing inscriptions referring to army surgeons, which suggested that although they were all known as _medicus_ there were degrees of rank amongst them, notably the _medicus legionis_ and the _medicus cohortis_. There is a well-preserved tablet in the Newcastle Museum found in that neighbourhood, commemorating a surgeon of the first Tungrian cohort, and one in Dresden, referring to a _medicus duplicatorius_, a term which indicates that the surgeon had been fortunate enough by his attainments to merit, and, we hope, receive double fees for his services.

All his antiquarian study was looked upon by Simpson himself as no more than a relaxation. Fatigued by days and nights of anxious consecutive professional work, he would suddenly dash off for a day into some part of the country where he knew there was a likely "find,"

leaving patients and students to the care of his a.s.sistants. Here he would press into service and infect with his spirit all sorts of local worthies from the squire or laird down to the labourer, who woke up at his stimulation to find that what had been of no concern to them and their fathers before them--perhaps objects of vituperation or superst.i.tious dread--were objects of keen delight and interest, and actually valuable to this astonishing man. Once on a professional visit to Fifeshire he quite casually discovered some remarkable though rough carvings in caves, representing various animals and curious emblems, and he was able to show that they presented features. .h.i.therto unnoticed. Fifeshire was famous for its underground dwellings, or, as they are locally called, "weems"--a term which gave origin to the t.i.tle of the Earldom of Wemyss. After such an excursion he would return to Queen Street full of boyish spirits, eager to narrate his discoveries to interested friends, and refreshed ready to resume the daily round of work. Archaeology was his hobby--the hobby on which he rode away for refreshment and relief from the monotony of his life's work; not only did the hobby constantly restore his flagging energies, but as it is given to few men to do, he put new life into his hobby whenever he bestrode it.

In the conduct of his practice he was somewhat negligent. He was one of the old school in these matters; he trusted his head rather than paper, and his head had had such a careful self-imposed training since childhood that it was a good servant. But where the brain has such enormous duties to perform, those which appear to it unimportant must of necessity be comparatively neglected.

Had he been more careful of pounds, shillings, and pence, he would have been more attentive to the details of practice. To Simpson, provided he had sufficient money for all his wants--and his wants were wide, for they included those of many others--pecuniary and business matters were of secondary consideration. In his student days he had lived carefully, accounting, as has been seen, for every trivial expenditure to those to whom he was indebted. But now he was free from the hara.s.sing necessity of exercising rigid economy, he cast aside the drudgery of business methods and disdained commercial considerations. He certainly received some very large fees, but the curious mixture of human beings who crowded his waiting-rooms were treated all alike whether they paid princely fees or no fee at all; lots were drawn daily for precedence, and they entered his presence according as they drew. His valet seems to have attained considerable skill in estimating the probable remunerative value of a roomful of waiting patients, and would grumble at night if on emptying the professor's pockets, as was his duty, the result fell short of his calculated antic.i.p.ations. The man did not approve of the master's habit of giving gratuitous service. There were many who were never asked for a fee, and many others whose proffered guineas were refused.

Simpson would not ask for money from those to whom he thought it was a struggle to pay him; the magnitude of his profit-yielding practice rendered this form of charity possible for him; from the really poor he always refused remuneration. His house was filled with all sorts of presents from patients, grateful for benefit conferred, grateful for generosity and consideration. He was also a free giver, and besides supporting orthodox charities made many gifts of goodly sums to persons who appeared to him to be in want, or who succeeded in impressing on him their need for help. He was imposed upon often enough; not seldom by pseudo-scientists full of some great discovery which a little more capital might enable them to complete. Once he corresponded with an enthusiast of this description who confessed that he had been breakfasting on a waistcoat, dining on a shirt, and supping on a pair of tough old leather boots, with the object of finding a solid substance, which combined with lead or tin would form gold--nothing more or less than the time-honoured philosopher's stone!

To such a man Simpson gave freely not only once.

To young students entering upon professional life with no other capital than their newly acquired qualifications to practice, he was ever generous. The Scots Universities sent forth many such youths, st.u.r.dy and independent, and with feelings that would be easily wounded by any attempt to patronise. But his gentleness, and the sympathy born of his own early experiences and shining in his eyes, made help from him something to be proud of.

It could never be urged against Simpson that he was avaricious. Just as when honours were showered upon him he accepted them with less thought of the personal honour than of the appreciation of his friends and the public, and rejoiced that they were pleased; so he rejoiced in the acquisition of ample means chiefly because of the pleasure he might derive therefrom by helping others.

His method of seeing patients was boldly haphazard; we learn with astonishment that he kept no list of his visits to be made, and started a day's round with only his prodigious memory to guide him as to where he should go. Such a method must have had the result that only cases of interest or urgency were seen. No doubt the able staff of a.s.sistants attended to the others, but these comprised not only sufferers from trivial complaints but those afflicted with imaginary ills who had come to see Simpson, not his a.s.sistant. Possibly they had already suffered many things of many physicians and were none the better. Such persons blamed Simpson with some reason. In the case of neurotic persons only was his method not reprehensible; continued attendance might have undone the benefit of the one application, if we may so term it, of his strong personality, which sometimes was all that was required, so superst.i.tious was the reverence for his powers.

A precise system of registration of engagements and visits ought certainly to have been adopted. We can sympathise with those who felt aggrieved that they could not obtain more attention from the great man, but it must be remembered that by his own method he saw a great number of difficult and dangerous cases, and was able to originate out of his wide and unprecedented experience, modes of treatment which are to-day valued highly and successfully made use of by his professional successors. He never wittingly left a fellow-creature's life in danger, but would hasten at all hours to cases of real urgency.

As is usual where large numbers are striving after the same object some were highly careless in their communications with him. Fees were sent to him with a request for a receipt, but no address was given.

Engagements were asked for by persons who neglected to say at what hotel they were staying; and others worried him for letters on quite trivial subjects. On one occasion, it is authentically related, a ten-pound note was forwarded to him by a man who might more reasonably have paid one hundred pounds. The note was somewhat carelessly not acknowledged, and the sender kept writing letters demanding an answer in increasing severity of tone. But he was left to rage in vain. A few nights later Simpson's sleep was disturbed by a rattling window; in the dark he rose and groped for a piece of paper wherewith to stuff the c.h.i.n.k and stop the irritating noise. His only comment next morning when his wife, having removed the paper and discovered its nature came to him with it, was, "Oh! it's _that_ ten pounds!"

There was a great want of method in all his arrangements, and Dr. Duns confesses to having had considerable difficulty in arranging Simpson's letters and papers, so carelessly were they kept.

The leading hotels in the city benefited by Simpson's reputation.

Patients and pilgrims filled their rooms long before tourists began to crowd Scotland as they do to-day. When Simpson was elected to the Chair of Midwifery loud complaints were uttered by the hotel proprietors. His predecessor, Professor Hamilton, had been a man of such wide reputation that they derived much profit from the patients sent in from the surrounding country to be attended by him. How could a young man like Simpson equal this? And yet when he died there was more than one hotel proprietor who could attribute no small measure of his own success to the patients and visitors who crowded not only from the country districts of Scotland but from the most remote parts of the British Empire, as well as from the great cities of Europe and America, to gain help or speech from or perhaps only to see this same Simpson. And his fame had reached the high point it ever after maintained when he was but a young man--before he was forty years of age. It was estimated that no less than eighty thousand pounds per annum was lost to the hotel, lodging, and boarding-house keepers of Edinburgh when he died.