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 THE 
 
 BATH PHYSICIANS 
 
 OF FORMER TIMES. 
 
 A Paper 
 
 Read before the Bath Literary and Philosophical 
 
 Association, October 20th, 1882, 
 
 BY 
 
 JEROM MURCH, 
 
 PRESIDENT OF THE ASSOCIATION. 
 
 BATH: 
 WILLIAM LEWIS & SON, "THE HERALD" OFFICE. 
 
 A7id all the Booksellers. 
 
 M' / 
 
 MDCCCLXXXII 
 
 ONE SHILLING. 
 
 '4
 
 ^THE 
 
 BATH PHYSICIANS 
 
 OF FORMER TIMES. 
 
 A Paper 
 
 Eead before the Bath Literary and Philosophical 
 
 Association, October 20th, 1882. 
 
 BY 
 
 JEROM [^MURCH, 
 
 PRESIDENT OF THE ASSOCIATION. 
 
 " A -wise physician skilled our wounds to heal 
 Is more than armies to the public weal." 
 
 Pope's Homer. 
 
 BATH: 
 WILLIAM LEWIS & SO^vT, " THE HERALD" OFFICE. 
 
 And all the Booksellers. 
 
 MDCCCLXXXII
 
 THE BATH PHYSICIANS 
 
 OF FORMER TIMES. 
 
 "7 
 
 In every country where medical science has been known 
 it has been honoured. From time immemorial its professors 
 have been amongst the greatest benefactors of mankind. 
 Large towns and rural districts alike testify to the good they 
 have done and continue to do. Without claiming extra- 
 ordinary admiration for those of our own city in former 
 times, I think I can show that many were men of considerable 
 learning and ability. They were closely identified with the 
 life of the place, its society, interests and character, and 
 therefore form a fit subject for one of our papers. 
 
 In some respects it may be a disadvantage that I do not 
 belong to the medical profession. But if, on the one hand, 
 more justice might have been done to scientific history, 
 perhaps, on the other, a broader view- may be taken of social 
 influences. In both cases the sources of information would 
 be the same ; chiefly old books of the sixteenth and 
 seventeenth centuries, most of which I have been fortunate 
 in finding in the Chapman Library of the Institution. 
 Amongst the volumes of recent date to which I am indebted 
 I wish to mention gratefully at once Dr, Munk's " Roll of 
 British Physicians," an extremely valuable work containing 
 a rich mine of biographical knowledge. 
 
 Going back to the earliest periods of local history, I find 
 nothing that bears on our subject. We have Roman 
 remains of various kinds in the building in which we are 
 now met, but how little do they tell us about Roman men. 
 Even those votive altars, so grand in their simplicity, are 
 commemorative only of the military class, worthy of lasting
 
 remembrance undoubtedly, but not the sole benefactors of 
 the time. We should have been thankful to know what had 
 been done for other sciences in which the " mother of 
 nations " excelled, especially for the science of healing, one 
 of the most ancient and practically useful. Is it not true 
 that, as Homer says — 
 
 A wise physician, skilled our wounds to heal, 
 Is more than armies to the public weal ? * 
 
 Failing to find signs of this wisdom during the time of the 
 Roman occupation, we should have liked to catch glimpses, 
 however faint, of the men who immediately followed, 
 powerless as they were to check the growing anarchy of the 
 fifth and sixth centuries. It is true that Gildas Badonicus, 
 a name indicating connection with Bath, wrote in his 
 monastery at Bangor of the wars and sufferings of the latter 
 part of the time, and Bede and Alcuin laid the foundation 
 of ecclesiastical history. But except a few faint traces of 
 hospitals for the sick cared for by monks, and of a society of 
 religious women who ministered to the poor at the baths, 
 we have no hints as to medical treatment in the scanty annals 
 of the time."}* 
 
 * Dr. Spender partly accounts for the absence of information on this 
 
 subject. After stating that the Romans relied upon their baths for " recreation, 
 cleanliness, and health," and that " imperial i^ride was in no instance so 
 conspicuous as in those grand structures," he adds : — " For six hundred years 
 Rome hardly knew any other medical aid than that of baths and a few empirical 
 nostrums. By the rational use of baths the ancients prevented and cured 
 diseases ; baths were ■niunera Divion, the theme of poets and historians, and 
 the sacred care of the Republic." — ^' The Bath Thermal Waters," by Dr. 
 Spender. 
 
 t " Among the good deeds of the warlike Offa," one of the Saxon kings 
 who loved Bath and dwelt here, " may be enumerated the repairs of the baths, 
 and the establishment of a Xenoclochiiun or hospital for the reception of 
 discharged strangers who journeyed to Bath for the waters." — Dr. Spender, 
 page IS. 
 
 In 1138 the Bishop of Bath and Wells built another hospital for the use of 
 the leprous poor, dedicated to S. Lawrence, and in 1180 his successor a third, 
 dedicated to St. John the Baptist, which still exists. Bellott's Hospital was 
 founded in the reign of .Tames I. ; the General or Mineral Water Hospital 
 1738.— Warner's History of Bath.
 
 It is not until the eleventh century that light begins to 
 (lawn upon us. For many years the Bath monastery had 
 been flourishing under the patronage of the Kings of Wessex 
 and Mercia. It was in full vigour at the time of the 
 coronation of King Eadgar in 973, when Elphege, its great 
 reformer, reigned as its abbot, adding to the attractions of 
 the springs those of his saintly character. As in the earliest 
 times every Egyptian physician was a priest, so in those of 
 which I am speaking every eminent ecclesiastic was skilled 
 in healing power. We have an instance in the first doctor of 
 any note in these parts, John de Villula, one of the many 
 able and aspiring men who came to England in the train of 
 William the Conqueror. The two-fold fame of Bath as the 
 City of the wonderful springs and the seat of a wealthy 
 monastery led him to separate himself from the Norman 
 warriors and countries and try his fortunes here. His success 
 was great ; he first acquired wealth by the practice of 
 medicine, and then employed it in consolidating power as an 
 ecclesiastic. How he rebuilt the Abbey ; how he attached it 
 to the Bishopric of Wells which he then held, and how, 
 through his influence as well as to his advantage, the two 
 sees were united, need not be dwelt upon at present. 
 
 Much of my information for this paper is gained from a 
 curious old book entitled "A Collection of Treatises Relating 
 to the City and Waters of Bath." The second edition, from 
 which I shall quote, was printed in 1725, its author being 
 styled in the title page *' The learned Dr. Thomas Guidott, 
 late Physician at the Bath/' He introduces John de Villula 
 in connection with the Abbey Church, of which he says: 
 "No other account need be given than that by Sir John 
 Harington, whose good-will to the church and city did rival 
 the acuteness of his wit and learning " The account is in 
 "A Latin poem in the ' Nugee Antiquas,' writ and spoken to 
 Bishop Montague at his first visitation and sight of the 
 church then uncovered," the manuscript having been found 
 in Sir John's study at Kelston after his death, and com-
 
 municated by his grandson* This Latin poem which gives 
 a history of the building Dr. Guidott translates. Not the 
 least amusing part of it refers to what was done by John de 
 Villula and yet to his small repute as a physician. Thus 
 runs the doggerel in allusion to his gifts to the Church being 
 larger than other gifts, and to his ignorance of the art by 
 which his wealth was acquired : — 
 
 "With greater cost John clept de Villa. 
 A Frenchman born, but silly fellow, 
 Profest the art, if story "s true, 
 The grounds of which he never knew." 
 
 Against Sir John Harington's opinion may be placed that 
 of an older historian, William of Malmesbury, who wrote 
 the life of John de Villula. It is true he speaks of him 
 as " Medicus probatus usu non Uteris," but he also 
 speaks of him as a patron of literature, possessed of 
 great medical skill, and outrunning all the physicians of 
 his time in honour and profit. He is further said to have 
 presided with dignity over the diocese thirty -four years, 
 and at his death in 1122 to have been buried in the 
 Abbey X!hurcli, where his tomb remained in the time of 
 Leland s« hundred years afterwards, though then fast falling 
 to decay, the building having been unroofed and the weeds 
 allowed to grow unchecked. 
 
 I quote here from Mr. Hunter's admirable paper on the 
 "Connection of Bath with the Literature and Science of 
 England." He m^entions several eminent men as part of the 
 
 * I need not remind Bath readers of the handsome monument of Bishop 
 Montague in the Bath Abbey, lately restored at much cost and with great 
 judgment by the Town Clerk of Bath, Mr. John Stone. In old records the 
 name is spelt Mountague. The Latin inscription in the "History and 
 Antiquities of the Cathedral Church of Salisbury and the Abbey Church at 
 Bath " gives the name Jacobus Montacutus. He was Bishop of Bath and Wells 
 in 1608, was aftewards translated to Winchester and died in 1618. He was 
 also one of the Lords of the Privy Council and Prelate of the Order of the 
 Garter. The " History and Antiquities" published in 1722 contains a list of 
 the donations to the rebuilding of the Abbey, and the copies of the inscriptions 
 on the monuments up to that time.
 
 brilliant company gathered together by John de Villula, 
 especially Adelard, an Oriental scholar and Hugelinus, 
 called in Domesday Book Interpres, a man of many 
 laneuasres. After them came William of Bath, a divine, 
 Henry of Bath, a lawyer, and Reginald of Bath, a physician, 
 all connected with the monastery, and all adding to their 
 ordinary avocations the advancement of literary and scientific 
 culture. We can imagine the interest they took in an 
 institution of more than local importance — the Abbey 
 Library — for it was so remarkable as to excite the admiration 
 of Leland, who knew all the great libraries of the kingdom ; 
 and we mav infer that medical science was not nedected 
 from the fact that in addition to books given by King 
 Athelstan, such as the Roman classics and translations from 
 the Arabic, special mention is made of the writings of the 
 more eminent physicians.* 
 
 There are other reasons for regarding the Bath monastery 
 as both the home and the school of Bath physicians of the 
 middle ages. Mr. Hunter mentions that a certain Prior 
 Robert in a chapter held in 1328 granted to one Magistrb 
 Johanno de Bathonia, Medico, ' a suitable chamber with free 
 ingress and egress for life. He was to have daily a gallon of 
 convent beer, two white loaves from the convent bakehouse, 
 and other allowances from the convent kitchen as well on 
 flesh days as on fish days, according to the exigency of each; 
 He was also to be provided every year with a robe such as 
 the clerks wore, and in return for these privileges he bound 
 himself to exercise due care and diligence in every thing 
 belonging to his profession required by the Prior and the 
 
 * In a former paper on William Prynne I drew attention to an old library 
 of later date — the seventeenth century— now in the Bath Abbey Church, as 
 containing Bome of the works of the great constitutional historian and others of 
 considerable value. Why is it not better known ? A list of the original donors 
 is given in the " History and Antiquities of Salisbury Cathedral and the Bath 
 Abbey."
 
 8 
 
 Monks, the medicine to be provided at the expense of the 
 house. A similar arrangement was made with a sculptor, 
 who, in consideration of bread and meat and beer and 
 lodging and a robe " de secta Armigerorum," undertook to 
 perform the carved work of the convent rather than that of 
 any other employment.* 
 
 Thus far our chief concern has been to see where the 
 medical profession obtained their principal training and their 
 authority to practise. We now come to the time when " a 
 great religious wave had passed over the land, and the 
 original seats of learning, piety and benevolence had been 
 broken up." Henceforth we have to observe a succession 
 of men who were educated at the National Universities, 
 and who carried on their work in Bath under dififerent 
 auspices. 
 
 One of the books to which I am indebted is by Dr. William 
 Turner, a thin black letter folio of great rarity and interest. 
 Printed in Germany in 1562, it is the earliest book on the 
 subject, and is entitled "A Booke of the Natures and 
 Properties as well of the Bathes in England as of other Bathes 
 in Germany and Italy," and though the author only styles 
 himself Doctor of Physic he was really also Dean of Wells. 
 The Church preferment was probably obtained for him 
 through the influence of the Duke of Somerset, Lord 
 Protector and uncle of Edward VI. Turner was some years 
 abroad in the service of the Duke, to whose son, the Earl of 
 Hereford, he dedicates his book. 
 
 " Hearing after my return to England," lie says, "that their was a 
 natural bathe within your father's Dukedome, I ceased not till I got 
 license to go to se the same bathe, which done, I carried certain 
 diseased persons with me, with whom I taried as long as I could. And 
 afterwards, being Dean of Wells, which place is not far from Bathe, 
 and having liberty to tary there so long as I list, 1 tried the same 
 bathes a little further and found by experience that they were a verye 
 excellent tresure, unworthily esteemed by such as have plenty of other 
 
 " Hunter's Connection of Bath with the Literatiu-e and Science of England.
 
 tresure, but which is not worthy to be compared with this precious 
 gift of God."* 
 
 There is anotlier curious old book of the sixteenth century 
 by l)r. John Jones, a worthy Welshman, "The Bathes of 
 Bathes Ayde wonderful and most excellent agaynst very 
 many Sicknesses." The date is 1572, just twenty years after 
 Dr. Turner's, like which it is in fjood clear black letter. The 
 author obtained celebrity by practising at stated times in 
 some of the chief cities in England, coming to Bath for what 
 was even then in Queen Elizabeth's reign, " the season." 
 That he practised in various places would tend to make the 
 waters known, while still further publicity would be given to 
 them by his book, connecting their application with the 
 general principles of medical and surgical science. Among 
 the amusing contents is a genealogical table preiaced by the 
 statement that, according to the chronology of Scripture, 
 Bladud discovered the springs " about the year 3080 of the 
 age of the world and 890 before the incarnation of Christ, 
 Elisha being then prophet in Israel." Here follow 29 circles, 
 representing 29 generations between Elisha and Adam and 
 Eve ; all which I mention merely to give an idea of the 
 British medical literature ol the sixteenth century. 
 
 At the end of the book is " A Prayer made by the Author of this 
 ayde," so run the ipsissima verba " to be saide by all persons diseased, 
 
 * So this curious book begins. It ends with the following admonition to all 
 who visit the baths : — 
 
 "As ye go homewards make but small journeys and beware 
 
 of surfetinge and colde and when ye are at home use 
 
 mesurable exercise daylye and honest myrthe 
 
 and pastyme wyth honest companj'e. 
 
 And beware of surf eting in anye 
 
 wyse and of anger and of 
 
 to much studye or 
 
 carefulnes. 
 
 Finis 
 
 Thankes be to God for all his giftes 
 
 Amen." 
 
 Dr. Turner also pubHshed in 1()13 "The Eare Treaeure of the Engli^^h Baths. 
 
 The Chai)man Library also contains a beautiful MS. volume by Dr. Turner in 
 
 the finest preservation, at the end of 300 years. 
 
 B
 
 10 
 
 meekly bending upon their knees before they enter the Bathes." And 
 that there might be no question of the good man's loyalty the prayer 
 ends with — 
 
 " God save the Queenes majestie and encrease the 
 
 fayth of thy Flocke, preserve the Councell 
 
 and all the Nobilitie, Spirituall 
 
 and Temporall."* 
 
 Dr. Guidott's book, of which I have spoken, contains 
 memoirs of eighteen Bath physicians. The period includes 
 seventy years of the time when the springs began to regain 
 their ancient Roman fame — from 1598 to 1668. The author 
 was himself a man of considerable attainments in medicine, 
 philosophy and natural history, a vehement opponent of 
 quackery in all its forms.t Of the eighteen I need only 
 mention a few of the most distinguished, by whom, whatever 
 may have been their proportions of public spirit and personal 
 ambition, the old reputation of the city was undoubtedly 
 revived. From that time the medical standard became 
 
 * In order to make known the true nature of the baths and to secure good 
 advice to patients needing them in various parts of the country, Dr. Jones 
 recommends that ecclesiastical preferment should be given in the principal 
 towns to medical men for the express purpose. "A meete stipend appointed of 
 some improprial benefice or parsonage or prebend at Salisbury, Worcester, 
 Herforde, Gloucester, Bristowe, Excester, Wels, Landathe, &c., the furthest of 
 not past a dayes journey as well for the pore as the ryche." 
 
 f Born in 1638, Dr. Guidott was fourth in descent from Signor Antonio 
 Guidotti, a native of Florence, who came to England in the reign of Edward VI., 
 by whom he was knighted. In 1G56 the descendant became a Commoner of 
 "Wadham College, Oxford, where he studied anatomy and medicine and began 
 to practise. Ten years afterwards he settled at Bath, encouraged by the friend- 
 ship of Dr. John Maplet, one of the mmiber whose lives he wrote. Though 
 his ability brought him considerable practice, his temper and his crusade against 
 quackery created many enemies. In a preface to Dr. Jorden's "Discourse of 
 Natural Bathes," he says, " Empiricks and juggling Medicasters do so much 
 abound that 'tis almost as hard a matter now to meet with a regular and 
 accomplished physitian as it was in former times for Diogenes to meet an honest 
 man." That he himself was competent appears in his various writings and 
 may be inferred from this — that for some years he practised in London as well 
 as in Bath, in London the greater part of the year and in Bath the summer 
 months ; also that he was ofiFered professional chairs at Venice and Leyden but 
 declined both.
 
 11 
 
 higher ; the professions of priest and physician were no 
 longer often combined ; men were educated for each dis- 
 tinctly, although the early training at the universities was 
 often in both cases the same. 
 
 One of the foremost in the list was Dr. Edward Jorden. 
 He was a man of good family, took his degree at Padua, 
 practised some time in London, and afterwards settled in 
 Bath. Another was Sir Edward Greaves, Baronet, of Al 
 Souls' College, Oxford, Physician in Ordinary to the King. 
 Taking the lead among his brethren, not more by his rank 
 than his character, he acquired a large fortune and lived to 
 a good old age. In wealth however he was surpassed by Dr. 
 Samuel Baue, a native of Colome, famed for his knowledge 
 of languages. This gentleman is said to have been also 
 famed for his costume, liking to show himself in purple velvet 
 and the finest linen mucli bedecked with lace. Of higher 
 mark was Dr. John Maplet, whose position, acquirements and 
 character were all remarkable. Educated at Christchurch, 
 first Proctor of his University, and then Principal of a 
 College, his antecedents favoured his success. At Oxford he 
 accepted invitations to travel on the Continent with two Lord 
 Falklands, first with the elder brother for two years, and then 
 on his death with the younger. Returning to England, he 
 practised at Bristol in the summer and at Bath in the 
 winter, with intervals in his professional labours for elegant 
 authorship, notably Latin epistles to distinguished friends. 
 The medical literature of the time owed something to Dr. 
 Venner. A huge monument in the Abbey sets forth how 
 learned and charitable he was, and that he wrote a book 
 called Via Recta ad Vitam Longam. If he followed his 
 own rules as to diet and regimen he was a good example of 
 their efiBcacy, for he lived to the age of eighty-five. The 
 monument attracted the notice of Pepys, who came for the 
 waters in 1668, and made a characteristic entry in his 
 " Diary." 
 
 * Pepys' Visit to Bath, June 14th, 1668. Diary Ed., 1877, VoU v.
 
 12 
 
 Of most of the eighteen Guidott writes favourably, praising 
 them in particular as gentlemen of culture and good standing. 
 Not in his list, though contemporaries, were Dr. ]\Iayow and 
 Dr. Peirce, but they were probably rivals and on some pro- 
 fessional questions antagonists. Mayow, wlio published his 
 opinion of the Bath Waters, differed from his brethren in 
 controverting the theory that nitre and sulphur were com- 
 ponents, and gave some sound chemical reasons for his view. 
 Peirce was a considerable author and ranked high in his 
 profession. He was a Commoner of Lincoln's Inn, Oxford, 
 and was created M.D. by his university. In longevity he 
 excelled Venner, living to be nearly a hundred years of age. 
 Where and why he disagreed with Guidott it is difficult to 
 ascertain, but there are passages in the writings of both 
 which show that the green-eyed monster had much to do 
 with it. Both published lists of cases they had treated, 
 which closely resemble those now treated from year to year 
 in our Mineral Water Hospital. In Peirce's experience there 
 is also this similarity : he lodged a large number of patients 
 in his own house, attending constantly to their various 
 
 " (Sunday.) Up and walked up and do^vn the town. Saw a pretty good 
 market place and many good streets and very fair stone houses A nd so to the 
 great church and saw Bishop Montagu's tomb, and, when placed, did there see 
 many brave people come, and, among others, two mea brought in in litters and 
 set down in the chancel, but I did not know one face. Here a good organ ; but 
 a vain pragmatical fellow preached a ridiculous affected sermon that made me 
 angry and some gentlemen who sat next me and sang well. So home, walking 
 round the walls of the city, which are good and the battlements all whole. After 
 dinner comes Mr. Butt again to see me, and he and I to church, where the same 
 idle fellow preached, and I slept most of the sermon. To this church again to 
 see it and look over the monuments, where, among others. Dr. Venner and 
 Pilling, and a lady of Sir W. Waller's ; he lying with his face broken " 
 
 Montague, mentioned page 6, was uncle to the Earl of Sandwich a family 
 connection of Pepys' ; Pilling was Rector of Bath, thirty years ; Lady Waller 
 was daughter of Sir Richard Reynell, wife of the Parliamentary General 
 
 The " good market place, many good streets, and very fair stone houses " 
 showed that Bath was no longer the wretched-looking place described by 
 Macaulay on the authority of Wood. The enlargements and improvements 
 begun iu the previous ceatury enabled the physicians to find suitable abodes.
 
 13 
 
 maladies. It was the old Abbey House ; in size and situation 
 nothing could be more convenient ; just between the church 
 and the bath, the church was reached by crossing a small 
 garden and the bath from a gallery overlooking it ; facilities 
 much valued by the ]30or cripples, some ot high rank and 
 living far away, who came to be cured.* The Abbey House, 
 we are informed by Mr. Peach, was rebuilt on the site of the 
 original monastic dwelling erected by John de Villula, 
 occupied in 1653 by Dr. Peirce, and pulled down for 
 improvements in iToo.-j- 
 
 One of the traditions of this period relates to the feeling 
 between London and Bath doctors. Not only was no love 
 lost but all possible hindrances were thrown by the higher 
 powers in the way of patients requiring the waters. Probably 
 those gentlemen saw with some concern the rapid transfer of 
 work to their provincial brethren. Dr. Spender states 
 that twenty physicians practised here in the season, besides 
 more than thirty apothecaries and not a few " chirurgeons."J 
 He quotes Dr. Baylis: "What a number of physicians ! How 
 exorbitant their fees and how infinite their prescriptions ! 
 Can all this be necessary ? Can the health and welfare of the 
 public require such multitudes ? " Looking at the then 
 small population, even including visitors, we are not surprised 
 at these questions. Nor again can we believe in the necessity 
 of so many books on the Bath AVaters, except to advance the 
 interests of the authors. Some, however, were undoubtedly 
 of permanent value : able, tlioughtful treatises, taking up 
 new points or throwing increased light on old ones. Dr. 
 
 * Bath Memoirs, or Observations in Three and Forty Years' Practice at the 
 Bath. By Robert Peirce, M.D., 1697. Munk's Roll of British Physicians, 
 t Historic Houses in Bath. By R E. Peach, 1S82. 
 
 I Bath Thermal Waters, p 150. This refers to the middle of the eighteenth 
 century. In connection with an earlier period (1713) Dr. Spender gives an 
 amusing quotation from " The Guardian'' to the same efifect, only that the 
 author being probably known as a gentleman of the Press was most generously 
 treated. " The physicians here," he says, " are very numerous, but very good 
 natured. To these charitable gentlemen I owe that I was cured in a week'a 
 time of more distempers than I ever had in my life.'
 
 14 
 
 Sutherland may have been too speculative in his chemical 
 theories, but both at Bath and Bristol Hotwells he 
 attained considerable eminence. His "Attempt to Revive 
 Antient Medical Doctrines," published in 1763, may even 
 now be read with interest. Dedicated to the Earl of North- 
 umberland, who filled various high offices in the State, it 
 aimed to show that the development of sanitary advantages, 
 like those at Bath, was a national duty, which ought to be 
 undertaken by the government. The author contended that 
 if to make ample provision for bathing were a matter of 
 imperial concern at Eome, if the Emperors not only raised 
 magnificent structures in the Capital, but ordered them to be 
 provided in all the chief provinces, even in Britain, the work 
 should not be neglected now. " Were simple, artificial baths 
 objects worthy of a Trajan, why should not natural hot 
 medicated springs be thought worthy of George V "Why 
 should imperial Britain be denied what imperial Bome 
 once bestowed on two of her legions only."* 
 
 The various physicians shared such advantages as the time 
 afforded. They occupied the few good houses, clustered as 
 they were around the baths, and having openings directly 
 communicating with them. In truth these doctors of the 
 seventeenth century were kings of the place, looked up to as 
 general authorities. The only other principal inhabitants 
 were a few of comparative little influence, who willingly gave 
 the lead to those by whom the great source of prosperity was 
 developed -f- As houses sprung up in all directions, as the 
 
 * Sutherlands Attempt to Kevive Antient Medical Doctrines, 176.3. 
 t But how powerless thay were in the most important matters is shown in 
 various records. At the time of the dissolution of the monastery the baths 
 were under the management of a man whose chief proBts arose from the use of 
 them by the gymnasts and athletes of the adjacent tennis-court. In 1632 all 
 order and propriety were so abandoned that Dr. Jorden complained to Francis, 
 Lord Cottington, Chancellor of the Exchequer, that the baths could not do 
 the good for which God had sent them to us for want of good government. 
 " The Queen of Charles I. went to Bourbon in France instead of Bath, for it 
 was a common report that all kinds of disorders had grown to the highest pitch 
 here." — Jorden's " Discourse of Naturalle Batfies," 1632.
 
 15 
 
 supply of the comforts and necessaries of life improved, and 
 as the climate and scenery became better known, the 
 permanent residents increased and the government of the 
 place improved. Then the doctors were succeeded in their 
 reign by new^ potentates, or rather the sovereignty was 
 divided, for though society required a Nash and civic affairs 
 a mixed corporation, though the best houses were also 
 wanted henceforth for magnates of a different kind, and other 
 professions grew in numbers and influence, yet the medical 
 profession retained a social and intellectual power not less 
 beneficial for being quietly used. 
 
 But let it not be thought that even when there w^as so 
 much to praise there were no inferior practitioners. One of 
 Dr. Guidotts eighteen was a Mr. Seneschall, whose quackery 
 was in the line of alchemy, and who gained notoriety by 
 wearing a fur coat in summer. It may be well perhaps 
 here to say a few words on what has been a fruitful subject of 
 satire — the costume of medical men in succeeding generations. 
 Not that I would suggest for a moment that costume always 
 signified quackery ; everyone knows that for a long time, in 
 towns of any note, physicians worthy of the highest respect 
 dressed for professional visits in great form. Our fathers and 
 grandfathers remembered them equipped with a bag wig, a 
 cocked hat, silk stockings, lace frills and ruffles, a gold-headed 
 cane, shoes with gold or silver buckles, a long straight coat, an 
 immense waistcoat and very small breeches. I have 
 mentioned Dr. Baue's fondness for purple velvet and fine 
 linen, in which he imitated the London fashion, silk being 
 also worn by the doctors there, but in Bath the usual 
 attire was less costly ; it was generally limited to the broad- 
 cloth produced by the local looms, though the cut was always 
 professional, and the other appendages of wig, hat, cane, &c., 
 never omitted. Hear, however, what Stowe tells us in his 
 "Survey of London," how a certain Dr. Langton in the 
 sixteenth century was accustomed to drive through Cheapside 
 on a market day in a car, " his outer attire being a gown of
 
 16 
 
 damask lined with velvet, covering a coat of velvet, his head 
 gear a velvet cap with a blue hood pinned over it." Another 
 writer states that some doctors carried absurdity so far as to 
 wear a large muff in cold weather that they might have 
 hands warm enough and delicate enough to discriminate to 
 a nicety the qualities of their patients' pulsations.* Carriages, 
 
 * Concerning muffs there is an anecdote in the life of Sir "VV. Browne, 
 President of the Royal College of Physicians, 1755-56. Foote in his "Devil on 
 Two Sticks" had resented something which Browne had written by representing 
 the Esculapian Knight on the stage, with the precise counterpart of his wig and 
 coat and odd figure and glass stiffly applied to his eye. Sir William sent Foote 
 a card complimenting him upon having so happily represented him, hut as he 
 had forgotten the tnuff he had sent him his ou-n. — MunA's Boll, vol. ii., 
 23.98. 
 
 Whilst at Bath, Browne paid a visit to Bishop Warburton at Prior Park, 
 described in a letter to Bishop Hurd. "The other day word was brought me 
 from below that one Sir William Browne sent up his name and would be glad 
 to kiss my baud. I judged it to be the famous physician whom I had never 
 seen nor had the honour to know. When I came down into the drawing room 
 I was accosted by a little well-fed gentleman with a large muff in one hand, a 
 small Horace open in the other, and a glass dangling in a black ribbon at his 
 button." The Bishop thea relates how Browne began by propounding a doubt 
 as to a passage in Horace, and before he could receive an answer "repeated his 
 own paraphrase of it in English verse, just come hot he said from the brain." 
 Assuming that the design of all this was to be admired, Warburton adds : 
 "Indeed he had my admiration to the full, but for nothing so much as for being 
 able at past eighty to perform this expedition on foot, in no good weather, and 
 with all the alacrity of a boy both in body and mind." — Roll, vol it., p. 102. 
 
 I have mentioned the gold-headed cane as part of the professional equip- 
 ment. Perhaps this custom may be traced back to the time when the 
 Athenian laws required that every man should be seen in the street with his 
 staff. In some countries doctors when visiting plague and fever cases carried 
 fumigating walking-sticks with pepper-castor heads containing essences of oils 
 and herbs to prevent infection. The lilirary of the Royal College of Physicians 
 contains the celebrated gold-headed cane which had beeu successively carried by 
 Dr. Radcliffe (the founder of the Radcliffe Museum at Oxford), Dr. 
 Mead, Dr. Askew, Dr. Pitcairn, and Dr. Baillie, having been deposited 
 there by the widow of Dr. Baillie. It is a Malacca cane, with a heavy gold 
 crutch handle bearing the arms of each of these physicians, of whom Dr. 
 William Macmichael, of Christ Church, a Radcliffe Travelling Fellow from 
 1811 to 1821, wrote biographical notices anonymously in a work called 
 " The Gold-headed Cane," and oa whom the following epitaph was written : — 
 
 " Here, ripe in years, in wisdom mellow, 
 Reposeth one most learned ' Fellow,'
 
 17 
 
 of course, were largely used, sometimes from necessity, roads 
 being bad and patients numerous, often as advertisements, 
 the more ambitious physicians driving about London with 
 four horses or even six. The usual dress is thus described : — 
 
 " Each son of Sol, to make him look more big. 
 Had on a large, grave, decent, three-tailed wig ; 
 His clothes full trimmed, with button-holes behind, 
 Stiff were the skirts, with buckram stoutly Hned ; 
 The purple velvet, or more reverend black. 
 Full made and powdered half-way down his back ; 
 Large, decent cuffs, which near the ground did reach, 
 With half-a-dozen buttons fixed on each ; 
 Grave were their faces, fixed in solemn state, 
 These men struck awe ; their children carried weight. 
 In reverent wiss old heads young shoulders bore. 
 And tweiitj'-five or thirty seemed fourscore."* 
 
 Dr. Guidott's list of the Bath Physicians brought us down to 
 the close of the seventeenth century. Much had been done in 
 the sixteenth to raise the profession above the level it had long 
 occupied. The greatest benefactor in this respect was Dr. 
 Linacre who grieved sorely at the abundance of incompetent 
 practitioners, and the absence of all legal restraint. Himself 
 a man of high character and rare attainments, taught by 
 Vitelli at Oxford and by Politian and Demetrius at Florence, 
 
 Who (h'ew an intellectual feast 
 From musty tomes in Pali-Mall East ; 
 Then wrote a book to prove his knowledge 
 And praise the Fellows of the College. 
 
 * JeaEFreson's "Book about Doctors" These lines bring to mind Peter 
 Pindar's description of Dr. Johnson's dress : — 
 
 " Methinks I view his full, plain suit of brown, 
 The large grey bushy wig that graced his crown ; 
 Black worsted stockings, little silver buckles, 
 And shirt that had no ruffles for his knuckles. 
 I mark the brown great coat of cloth he wore. 
 That two huge Patagonian pockets bore. 
 Which Patagonians (wondrous to unfold ! 
 Would fairly both his Dictionaries hold.'
 
 & 
 
 18 
 
 Physician successively to Lorenzo de Medici, Henry VII. and 
 Henry VHL, the friend of Tonstal, Latimer, Melancthon, 
 Erasmus, Sir Thomas More, Cardinal Wolsey and Arch- 
 bishop Warham, who more likely to command attention to a 
 great scheme of reform ? For some time Linacre was 
 connected, if not with Bath, certainly with Somersetshire. 
 Ten years prior to his appearance as a medical reformer, 
 though he had passed the meridian of life, he became a 
 priest. Leaving London when at the highest point of 
 professional success, he was first made rector of a small 
 parish in Kent, and then prebendary of Easton-inGordano 
 at Wells. While filling other ecclesiastical offices in future 
 years he devised the remedy for the evils of his former 
 profession by originating the Royal College of Physicians, 
 in which he had the powerful aid of the King and his 
 minister, Wolsey, Framed on the lines of similar institutions 
 in Italy, with the working of which Linacre was familiar, the 
 charter amongst various salutary provisions required that 
 candidates intending to practise should be examined by the 
 President and three of the Elects, who should have power to 
 grant letters testimonial to those who were duly qualified, 
 unless they should be graduates at Oxford or Cambridge 
 which would answer the same purpose.* 
 
 '' Munk's Roll. — The biographies of the period contain many proofs of the 
 intellectual influence of Linacre. Lately a new edition has been published of 
 "The Boke named the Governour," a very remarkable work on education, 
 which passed through eight editions between 1530 and 1580. The author was 
 Sir Thomas Elyot, "Knight, Diplomatist and Scholar,"' born about 1490, 
 probably in Wiltshire, who amongst his multifarious studies, found time for 
 medical science. In a review of his principal work in the Times, of October 
 18th, 1881, I find the following passage : "Young Elyot was educated at no 
 University, but he received a training better than Oxford or Cambridge could 
 give him from his father (the Attorney- General to the Queen and Judge k» the 
 Common Pleas), and from the group of learned men who clustered round Sir 
 Thomas More, notably from Linacre, the Head of the College of Physicians and 
 one of the chief representatives of the new learning in England. It was from 
 the influence of Linacre, we cannot doubt, that Elyot first gained that knowledge 
 of medicine which appears in one of his books: 'The Castle of Healthe,' 
 embodying as it does a study of the works of Hippocrates, Galenus, Oribasius,
 
 19 
 
 To the requirements of the new College of Physicians we 
 undoubtedly owe the higher character of the profession in 
 the seventeenth century. Looking at the circumstances of 
 our city, we may ask, what, without tlie rules Linacre intro- 
 duced and the nobler spirit he encouraged, would have 
 been the state of things in the eighteenth ? A place which 
 had suddenly become the chief seat of health, pleasure and 
 frivolity, the resort of all kinds of people from all parts of 
 the kingdom, especially those who had money to spend, 
 could not fail to attract ignorant empirics. Even with the 
 restrictions of the Royal College, what fruitful subjects for 
 satire were found by Anstey, Smollett and Fielding ; what 
 tempting material for every literary wit in the tricks of rival 
 doctors played off on country squires and their families ! In 
 Anstey "s Bath Guide we find Mr, Simpkin addressing his 
 mother : — 
 
 " And so as I grew every day worse and worse 
 The doctor advised me to send for a nurse, 
 And the nurse was so willing my health to restore, 
 She begged me to send for a few doctors more ; 
 For when any difficult work's to be done 
 Many heads can dispatch it much better than one." 
 
 Hear the subject of consultation when the wise men meet at 
 the patient's house : — 
 
 " So they all meet together and thus began talking, 
 Good doctor, I'm yours — 'tis a fine day for walking. 
 Sad news in the papers God knows who's to blame, 
 The colonies seem to be all in a flame. 
 This stamp-act no doubt might be good for the Crown, 
 But I fear 'tis a pill that will never go down. 
 What can Portugal mean ? Is she going to stir up 
 Convulsions and heats in the bowels of Europe ?" 
 
 Passing over the plaintive entreaty of the poor sufierer that 
 his case should be considered, we come to what Jenny did' : — 
 
 Paulus, Celius, Trallianus, Celsus, and Plinius. This list is worthy of Chaucer's 
 'Doctoxir of Physick,' but it only represents one side of Elyot's reading."
 
 20 
 
 " So thus they brushed off each his caue at his nose 
 When Jenny came in who had heard all their prose 
 I'll teach them says she at their next consultation 
 To come and take fees for the good of the nation. 
 I could not conceive Nvhat the devil she meant, 
 But she seized all the stuff that the doctors had sent, 
 And out of the window she flung it down souse 
 As the first politician went out of the house. 
 Decoctions and syrups around him all flew. 
 The pills, bolus, julep and apozem too. 
 His wig had the luck a cathartic to meet, 
 And squash went the gallipot under his feet." 
 
 As if in order that the weak points of those Bath doctors 
 should never be forgotten, Cruikshank gave a Hfe-hke picture 
 of all this in Britten's edition of Anstey. But more deserving 
 of castigation were many men in other places, men like 
 Graham, the earth-doctor, who mingled temporal and spiritual 
 nostrums, and published catch-penny books about the baths ; 
 and the more notorious Hill, commonly called Sir John Hill. 
 Between the latter, whose title was due to some Swedish 
 order he had managed to get, and a pretender in another 
 line, called Orator Henley, an amusing parallel is drawn in 
 the elder D'Israeli's work entitled "Quarrels of Authors."* 
 Rejected by all the learned societies in succession because of 
 his wretched temper and doubtful attainments, Hill attacked 
 them all with equal asperity. While in fighting his way as 
 successively actor, author, quack- doctor and herbalist, he 
 drew upon himself a shower of epigrams which furnished 
 endless subjects of conversation. Garrick said of his two- 
 fold character of playwright and physician : — 
 
 " For physic and farces his equal there scarce is, 
 His farce is a physic, his physic a farce is." 
 
 Some other wit invoked for him this fate : — 
 
 " The worst that we wish thee for all thy vile crimes 
 Is to take thine own physic and read thine own rhymes." 
 
 * Anstey's Bath Guide. Britten's Preface.
 
 21 
 
 A third, however, was not satisfied that such should be tlie 
 punishment, and added : — 
 
 " No, let the order be reversed. 
 Or else ualashed his crimes ! 
 For if he takes his physic first 
 He'll never read his rhymes."* 
 
 After this glance at the weaknesses of the eighteenth 
 century, let us look at the strong points. Happily there 
 were men in Bath, as elsewhere, who were worthy of honour, 
 for this reason, if for no other — that even those times did not 
 spoil them. That empty pretenders should flourish where 
 foolish and wealthy idlers abounded was not strange, but we 
 have ample proof that the requirements of better spirits were 
 also met. Great as the repute of the springs became, they 
 would not have drawn together so many men of mark, 
 nobles and statesmen, authors, artists, divines and philo- 
 sophers unless thoroughly competent physicians, educated, 
 accomplished gentlemen, had also been found here. 
 
 Of this class were the two Olivers who followed, one dying 
 in 1716, the other in 1 764. Both were Fellows of the Royal 
 Societ}'', and both men of good standing in the profession. I 
 have been unable to learn whether they were related ; the 
 second at all events was a member of the family who have 
 long owned the Manor of Weston, near Bath.f His predecessor 
 while studying at a Dutch University Joined the expedition 
 of the Prince of Orange. Coming to England with the 
 Prince's Army he became physician to the Fleet, but soon 
 afterwards settled in Bath. Amongst various books he 
 published here was " An Account of an Extraordinary 
 Sleeper at Timsbury, with an Essay on the Powers of the 
 Soul and its several operations." The second Dr. Oliver, 
 
 * Timbs's "Doctors and Patients " 
 t Britten gives short memoirs of the Olivers in his History of Bath Abbey, 
 but throws doubtful hght on the (juestion of relationship, stating in one place 
 that the second was probably the son of the first and in another that the first 
 died unmarried.
 
 22 
 
 also an author, and the inventor of the speciality known as 
 Oliver's biscuits, had a large practice in the middle of the 
 last century. He was one of the first physicians to the 
 Mineral Water Hospital, which owed much to him in various 
 ways. The picture in the Board Room of patients appearing 
 before him and the apothecary conveys the idea of a sensible, 
 benevolent man, perhaps a little stately and pompous. That 
 one at least of his patients admired him is evident from 
 some amusing lines in the fourth edition of Mary Chandler's 
 poems, published in 1738 ; he had attended her in a 
 dangerous illness. 
 
 "Pure goodness winged your feet, iuspired your tongue ; 
 Soft were your accents, but your reasoning strong. 
 Heaven bade me live and you prescrib'd the way ; 
 To you, next Heaven, my gi-ateful thanks I pay. 
 And now I breathe and live and sing anew, 
 And owe my breath and life and song to you." * 
 
 * Mrs Mary Chandler was the daughter of the Rev. Henry Chandler and the 
 sister of the Rev. Dr. Samuel Chandler, both Nonconformist divines in Bath, 
 pastors of the congregation now assembling in Trim Street. The latter left his 
 mark on the century as one of the ablest defenders of revelation. His sister was 
 a milliner, much respected for her business qualifications as v/ell as her 
 intellectual ability. In the preface to her poem, not ashamed of her calling, 
 she says she preferred the reputation of an honest trader to that of an author. 
 No one w.nild expect verses so feeble to run through four editions in the present 
 day, even though the chief subject were a member of the Royal family, but the 
 standard of merit was different then and the Princess Amelia was "a bright 
 particular star." Of the springs Mrs. Chandler is naturally very eulogistic. 
 After describing the complaints for which patients came to be cured, she says : 
 
 " Our waters wash those numerous ills away. 
 And grant the trembling wretch a longer day. 
 If but one Leper cured makes Jordan's stream 
 In sacred writ a venerable theme ; 
 What honours to thy sovereign waters due 
 When tick by thousands do their health renew." 
 
 The second Dr. Oliver was buried in Weston Church, where, and in the 
 adjoining cemetery, I find records of the following interments of Bath medical 
 men : — 
 
 George Cheyne, M.D. ... ... died 1743, aged 72 
 
 John Clarke Scott, M.D. ... „ 1805, „ 62 
 
 William Falconer, M.D, ... „ 1824, „ 80
 
 23 
 
 I have mentioned two medical books by Bath men in the 
 sixteenth century, two by Dr. Turner and one by Dr. Jones. 
 In a Hst of a local collector I find the titles of twelve in the 
 seventeenth and twenty-eight in the eighteenth. It would 
 be tedious to give even the titles of all of them ; a few I 
 have already mentioned in noticing their authors, and others 
 I have yet to speak of They are chiefly on the Bath waters, 
 and show the steadily increasing interest of three hundred 
 years. Some of the authors were men of larger experience, 
 and left their mark on the medical literature of the country 
 accordingly.* Amongst these was Dr. Cheyne, a native of 
 Scotland and a contemporary of the Olivers, who, in addition 
 to able treatises on the usual subject, published a number of 
 theological and philosophical works. The spirit in which he 
 wrote may be inferred from a passage in his "Essay on 
 Health and Life," referring to the unseemly language ot 
 certain controversialists : — " I heartily condemn and detest 
 
 Edward Percival, M.D. ... died 1831, aged 68 
 
 Thomas Falconer, Clerk and M.D. „ 1839, „ 68 
 George Kitson, Surgeon ... ... ,, 1859, ,, 78 
 
 Though Dr. Oliver was honoured with a monument in Bath Abbey, his 
 friends also placed a tablet to his memory, with a long eulogistic inscription, 
 in the church at Weston. The Church Rambler, vol. I., 1876. 
 
 * The list of Mr. Frederick Shum, the friend, who kindly lent it to me for 
 this paper, includes probably the greater part of the books on the Bath waters, 
 though not aU. I have met with a few others, but the proportions in the three 
 centuries appear to be nearly the same. 
 
 In the discussion that followed this paper Dr. Spender added to the 
 information in his comprehensive volume some remarks on the medical 
 literature of the springs, dividing it into three epochs. 1. — The "empirical 
 period" from the earliest bibliography to shortly after the middle of the 
 17th centurj ; Jones, Turner and Vernier are the chief writers. 2. — Guidott 
 was the link between the first period and the second. Pierce and Oliver 
 were the prophets of the second, characterized by the exclusion of mere 
 speculation, and reliance on "judicious observations" and patient enquiry. 
 3. — The third period owes its importance to the establishment of the Mineral 
 Water Hospital, and the impulse which this institution gave to the medical 
 study of the Waters. Summers and Charleton were the principal physicians of 
 the new school. Dr. Sutherland was too much led astray by mere chemical 
 theories.
 
 24 
 
 all malicious and unmannerly terms, and all false and unjust 
 misrepresentations, as unbecoming gentlemen, scholars and 
 Christians." The Biographia Britanncia says of him : — 
 " He is to be ranked amongst those physicians who have 
 accounted for the operations of medicine and the morbid 
 alterations which take place in the human body upon 
 mechanical principles. A spirit of piety and benevolence, 
 and an ardent zeal for the interests of virtue, are predominant 
 throughout his writings/' Dr. Cheyne was born in 1 671, and 
 died in 1743* 
 
 The next name is better known in Bath. I have 
 mentioned Sir John Harington in connection with John de 
 Villula and the Abbey Church. Of the "witty and learned 
 knight " the godson of Queen Elizabeth, Dr. Henry 
 Harington, was a direct descendant. Born at Kelston in 
 1727 and originally intended for the church he finished his 
 education at Oxford but preferred the medical profession. 
 To much knowledge of it he added other attainments, 
 classical, musical, mechanical and mathematical, rarely found 
 in the same person. In connection with two friends whom 
 I knew fifty years ago — the Rev. John Bowen and the Rev. 
 Thomas Broadhurst — he founded in 1795 the Bath Harmonic 
 Society with the remnant of the Catch Club. He published 
 many elegant musical compositions, excelling his con- 
 temporaries both in glees and anthems, though his fame 
 rested chiefly on his " Eloi," or " The last words of our 
 Saviour," which was sung for many years on Good Friday 
 in the Abbey and other churches in Bath.-f* The versatility 
 of his mind on various subjects is shown in works as different 
 from each other as the " Ode to Discord " and the " Ode to 
 Harmony," the "Witch of Wokey," a ballad in the old 
 English style, and the " Geometrical Analogy of the Catholic 
 Doctrine of the Trinity." True as well as graceful are the 
 lines on his monument in the Abbey : — 
 
 ' Alibone's Dictionary of English Literature, 
 t Britten's History of Bath Abbey Church,
 
 25 
 
 Medicus solas et fidelis : 
 
 Poeta lepidus : 
 
 Miisicns sciens et peritus : 
 
 Magistratiia gravis, Justus, acer : 
 
 Of his wit we have a proof in the well-known epigram : 
 
 "These walls adorned with mouumeut and bust 
 Shew how Bath waters serve to lay the dust." 
 
 Dying as late as 1816 he was remembered by many whom 
 I have known for his genial manners, his agreeable conver- 
 sation, his rich store of anecdote and unfailing benevolence. 
 Mr. Monkland describes him amongst a knot of good talkers 
 at Bull's Library, in his accustomed chair with his full- 
 bottomed wig and three-cornered hat, full of animation, 
 though then quite blind, and approaching his ninetieth year.* 
 He died at his house in Northumberland Buildings.-f- 
 
 * The Literature and Literati of Batli. 
 t Now the offices of Mr. T. W. Gibbs. 
 That there is much to make the name of Harington remembered here is 
 still known amongst us, though the feeling may not be so strong as it was when 
 in 1770 the Rev. Canon Harington of Norwich, brother of the Bath physician, 
 published the " new, corrected and enlarged edition" of the Nugse Antiquse. 
 Here we find the Latin Poem I have mentioned as quoted by Guidott, and 
 addressed to Bishop Montague on the roofless state of the Abbey Church, 
 together with a mass of curious information respecting contemporary prelates 
 and ecclesiastical matters. Another descendant of Queen Elizabeth's godson, 
 the late Eev Chancellor Harington of Exeter, while bequeathing handsome 
 sums to various good public objects was mindful of the ancient seat of his 
 family in giving liberally to the poor of Kelston. 
 
 In the Chapman Library, at the Institution, is a book by Sir Edw.ard 
 Harington, son of Dr. Harington, of Bath, which gives a good idea of the 
 author, especially of his humour : " A Schizzo (scketch) ou the Genius of Man, 
 iu which the merit of Mr. Thomas Barker, the celebrated young painter of Bath, 
 is considered " Here and in the "Nugse Antiquaj" are scattered fragments of 
 Harington family history, which would well repay the labour of arrangement and 
 consolidation. We learn that the family, dating back to tlie reign of Edward 
 I., assumed their name from Haveringtoo in Cumberland, "which Lordship 
 they possessed though their chief seat was at Aldingham in Lancashire." In 
 the reign of Edward III., John Haryngton, who aided William D'Eincourt in 
 the defence of the Scottish marches, was summoned by Parliament among the 
 Barons of the realm, and in the reigns of Henry IV. and Henry V. another 
 descendatjt became Knight of the Garter. Some time before the barony 
 expired (temp: Henry IV.) the seat of the family was at Chewton in Somerset-
 
 26 
 
 Following chronological order, I come to the first Dr. 
 Falconer. In connection with him, if our time had allowed, 
 would have been his son and grandson, I do not know 
 another instance in our annals of three generations succeeding 
 each other in the medical profession. Much might be said 
 of the ancestors of the Falconers, distinguished as they were 
 in Scottish history and in science and literature. Our library 
 contains a work on the county of Monmouth, where a branch 
 of the family settled, showing that its genealogical liead was 
 Sir Alexander Falconer, a Lord of Session in 1639, and 
 that amongst subsequent family connections were Hume the 
 historian, Drummond of Hawthornden the poet, and 
 Pennant the antiquary and naturalist. 
 
 The first Dr. Falconer was son of the Recorder of Chester, 
 where he was born in 1744. He settled at Bath in 1770, was 
 admitted a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1773, became 
 physician to the Mineral Water Hospital in 1784, and died 
 at his house in the Circus, No. 29, in 1824. Probably no 
 member of the profession in our city has equalled him in 
 learning or authorship, if we may judge from a list of forty- 
 seven books written by him. Many are on medical subjects, 
 some on classical and theological, some on botany and 
 natural history, the latter including papers contributed to two 
 societies in which he took great interest — the Bath and 
 West of England Agricultural and the Manchester Literary 
 and Philosophical. His books on the Bath waters were long 
 in high repute. To an " Essay on the Influence of the 
 
 shire. To Sir James Haryngton Edward IV. granted lands for his services in 
 taking Henry VI. prisoner, but these were forfeited again to Henry VII., at 
 the battle of Bosworth. Once more the tide of fortune turned under Henry 
 VIII., whom the father of the Sir John Harington of Kelston, who is quoted 
 in these pages, served in various ways, and who rewarded his adherent not only 
 by giving him his natural daughter in marriage but by adding a list of rich 
 manors, which had belonged to the Bath monastery, including those of Kelston 
 and St. Catherine Thus it was that Queeu Elizabeth came to be the god- 
 mother of Sir John Harington of Kelston, and to honour him and the city of 
 Bath with a visit. Sir Edward Harington writes of having the blood of Henry 
 VIII. in his veins.
 
 27 
 
 Passions on the Disorders of the Body," the third edition of 
 which was published in 1796, was adjudged the first 
 Fothergillian Gold Medal. To another on " The Diseases of 
 the Hip Joint, and on the use of the Bath Waters as a 
 Remedy," published in 1805, the Medical Society of London 
 adjudged its silver medal. The list containing these 
 particulars is appended by his grandson, the late Mr. 
 Thomas Falconer, County-court Judge, to the third edition 
 of a book of great research and ability — " A Dissertation on 
 St Paul's Voyage from Caesarea to Puteoli." Referring to 
 " Observations relating to Natural History selected from the 
 principal writers of antiquity," Dr. Parr says : — " I have 
 lately been instrumental in procuring from the Cambridge 
 Press the publication of a work on botanical subjects by my 
 friend Dr. Falconer whose knowledge is various and 
 profound, and whose discrimination on all topics of literature 
 are ready, vigorous, and comprehensive." The high opinion 
 entertained of him by his brethren in the Metropolis, as well 
 as his general reputation, led to his being consulted by a 
 large number of distinguished people who came to Bath, 
 amongst them the younger Pitt, whom he attended here in 
 his last illness, in 1805. And with reference to his position 
 in local society, which was about that time in its most 
 brilliant phase, marked by rare refinement and intelligence,. 
 Mrs. Piozzi relates that when any doubt existed amongst 
 the literati, either on a point of scholarship or an 
 historical fact, the common remark was " We must go to 
 Falconer." * 
 
 * A few lines with reference to Judge Falconer whose list of his grand- 
 father's works I have quoted. On retiring from the office which he filled in 
 South \N ales so long and honourably, M r. Thomas Falconer returned to Bath 
 to spend the remainder of his life. Amongst those who have been connected 
 with our city he ought to be held in grateful remembrance for his deep interest 
 from youth to age in every thing connected with the improvement of the 
 working classes. For many years, in early life, he gave great aid to the 
 " Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge," supporting his friend Lord 
 Brougham, the President, and writing or editing a large number of publications.
 
 28 
 
 In conclusion I can do little more than glance at a few 
 other Bath physicians of the eighteenth century. Some were 
 comparatively independent of practice, preferring our city 
 for its social, intellectual and sanitary advantages. Others 
 shared in various degrees the work of their profession, culti- 
 vating also their love of science and literature, and promoting 
 useful institutions. 
 
 Of the former class was Dr. Hartley, born in 1705, author 
 of " Observations on Man," worthy of very honourable mention 
 both for his mental and moral qualities. Intended for the 
 church, but unable to sign the articles, he yet continued in 
 her communion and enjoyed the friendship of some of her 
 distinguished sons, notably Bishops Hurd, Butler and 
 Warburton. These and other eminent men he probably met 
 around the hospitable table of Ralph Allen, where his gentle 
 manners, benevolent disposition and rare attainments would 
 always make him a welcome guest. His son, who succeeded 
 him in his house in Belvedere, became member of Parliament 
 for Hull.- 
 
 Of Dr. Moysey, born in 1715, I could have wislied to write 
 
 The experience he afterwards acquired as a judge amongst the mining 
 population of South Wales, combined with his sympathy for suffering and 
 his abhorrence of injustice, led him to labour successfully for the extinction of 
 the truck system and other kindred evils. To many educational societies he 
 was a most generous and useful friend, presiding at their meetings and presenting 
 books to their libraries. After he came back to Bath he contributed very 
 liberally to the shelves of the Bath Institution. His death occurred in August, 
 1882. 
 
 * Dr. Hartley derived repute as a Bath physician from a work on the 
 "Stone," of which he himself was a victim. He was best known by his 
 " Observations on Man, his Frame, his Duty and his Expectations." Of this 
 valuable book there were several editions, one by his son, with notes from the 
 German by Dr. Pistorius, another by Dr. Priestley, whom Dr. Johnson quotes 
 as saying, that he "had learned more from Hartley's book than from any he had 
 ever read except the Bible." — BosweU's Life of Johnson. 
 
 His son, David Hartley, M.P., who died at Bath in 1813, was one of the 
 plenipotentiaries appointed to treat with Dr. Franklin, the American Ambas- 
 sador at Paris. Some of his letters will be found in Franklin's correspondence. 
 He was the author of various works, scienti6c and political, the latter chiefly 
 against the American war. — AlbonL's Dictionary of English Literature.
 
 29 
 
 more fully, because both from family circumstances and 
 professional ability he is an interesting addition to my list. 
 He appears to have been descended from an old Devon shire 
 family and educated at St. John's College, Oxford, possess- 
 ing property at Hinton Charterhouse but residing in Bath 
 till his death in 178!). One of his sons was a Welsh Judge, 
 who married a daughter of Sir Richard Warwick Bampfylde, 
 of Poltimore and represented Bath in Parliament ten years, 
 defeating at the election of 1784 the younger Pitt by a 
 majority of three* A grandson lived here within the 
 memory of some of us, the Venerable Archdeacon Moysey, 
 many years Rector of Walcot, who distinguished himself as 
 a Bampton lecturer, andtheauthorof other theological works. 
 A great grandson, Mr. Henry Gorges Moysey, of Bathealton 
 Court, is well known as a useful mas-istrate of the County of 
 Somerset, 
 
 Mr. Monkland in his pleasant essay on the " Literature 
 and Literati of Bath " mentions Dr. Smollett as " having had 
 serious thoughts of settling here as a physician." I have 
 been unable to find confirmation of this in the copious 
 memoir prefixed to the best edition of his works, though he 
 certainly lived here some time, and published a treatise on 
 the waters. The author of the memoir was Dr. John Moore 
 of Glasgow, who gives a letter written to him in J 767, 
 requesting an answer to his residence in Gay Street, It is 
 said that the great potentate, Nash, warmly opposed his 
 settlement at Bath. No reason is assigned, but people 
 believed that the sting of the satirist had been keenly felt. 
 Was it in revenge for the opposition or one of the causes that 
 Smollett lashed in " Roderick Random " the rudeness of the 
 Master of the Ceremonies at the Rooms to a young lady some- 
 what deformed ? The story is that to excite a laugh against 
 her he asked her if she could tell him the name of Tobit's 
 
 * The Corporation of Bath being then the elective body, the numbers at the 
 poll were Pratt, 27 ; Moysey, 17; Pitt, 14. A letter from George III, in the 
 appendix to Lord Stanhope's Life of Pitt shows that the King was vexed at 
 this result.
 
 30 
 
 dog, " Yes," she answered, " his name was Nash, and 
 an impudent dog he was." It was certainly in Bath that 
 Dr. Smollett wrote " Humphrey Clinker ; " the date of its 
 publication as well as its vivid pictures of local life bearing 
 witness to the fact. In " Peregrine Pickle " and other 
 works from his pen wo find similar pictures, valuable, no 
 doubt, as those of the larger world of London are, for their 
 truth, but often extremely repulsive by their coarseness. 
 His biographer while doing full justice to his great merits as 
 poet, novelist and historian, admits that " in his humorous 
 and satirical descriptions he sometimes leaves delicacy far 
 behind."* Stronger language might have been used. 
 
 Very different were two other literary physicians who 
 lived here at the end of the eighteenth century — Dr. Cogan 
 and Dr. Sherwen. Dr. Cogan did not practise in Bath, 
 though he retained his deep interest in medical science and 
 founded here in 1805 a Humane Society like one which 
 owed its existence to him in London. There he had acquired 
 celebrity and considerable fortune in the obstetrical branch 
 of his profession, concerning which some amusing anecdotes 
 are related in a memoir by Dr. Hunter.-f* We are told 
 how his night practice was so large that the footpads knew 
 him but generally spared him, though on one occasion he 
 was taken, blindfolded, carried to a ladies' room in a hand- 
 some house, paid a fifty pound note, and in due time 
 conducted away, still ignorant as to his employer. Dr. 
 Cogan appears to have disregarded the common custom of 
 dressing professionally, so that a lady once said to him, 
 " Pray, sir, can you be a doctor, you dress like a gentleman ?" 
 and he answered, " Really, madam, if it will increase your 
 confidence or contribute to your ease, I will send for my cane 
 and my very best wig." We like to think of this clever, 
 prosperous man, tearing himself away from London work for 
 repose by no means undignified in Bath, writing on the 
 
 * Moore's Memoir of Smollett. Ed. , 1872. 
 + Old Age in Bath, by Dr. H. J. Hunter.
 
 31 
 
 passions, on agriculture, on original sin, and other theological 
 subjects, valuing the ministry and friendship of Mr. Jay, the 
 Independent minister, notwithstanding his own heterodox 
 opinions and his attachment to Mr. Hunter, always, even to 
 extreme old age, exemplifying his own cheerful philosophy — 
 
 " from strength to strength, 
 Through joy and gladsome cheer," 
 
 " as if determined that the sight of home should not prevent 
 his enjoying the last mile as much as the first."* 
 
 For want of time I must not say more of Dr. Sherwen than 
 that of him also Dr. Hunter has given a memoir showing 
 that, for twenty years possessed of much learning and con- 
 vinced that industry was essential to health, he here laboured 
 at literary works. To physicians of a later period " the Bath 
 Institution " was largely indebted for its origin. For some 
 time they had Symposia at their houses, remarkable for 
 intellectual characteristics — rare in provincial towns. We 
 are reminded by them of what Edinburgh was in the time of 
 Scott and Jeffery, and Norwich in that of the Enfields, Taylors, 
 and Martineaus, Here was Dr. Haygarth, in whose house 
 for several years some of the best men of the city assembled 
 weekly for mutual intercourse on scientific and philosophical 
 subjects, the nodes ccenccque Beorum in the Queen of the 
 West. Here was Dr. Percival, " the worthy son of a worthy 
 sire," whose father was the life of every good movement in 
 Manchester, and who himself proved how compatible literary 
 tastes were with solid professional distinction. Here were, 
 of earlier fame, Dr. Johnson, who published the Herbal of 
 
 * The Eev. Joseph Hunter, F.S.A., father of the author of "Old Age in 
 Bath," himself distinguished as one of the founders of the Bath Institution and 
 the author of "The History of Hallamshire," and other learned works. He 
 was for twenty-four years the pastor of the Unitarian congregation in Bath ; 
 removing to London in 1833 to fill the office of Assistant Commissioner of 
 Public Records. In the notes to his " Lecture on the Connection of Bath with 
 the Literature and Science of England," he writes of Dr. Cogan as one of the 
 friends who concurred in the invitation which brought him to Bath.
 
 32 
 
 Gerarde, then one of the best botanical works in England,* 
 and Dr. Sibthorp, whose beautiful monument by Flaxman 
 adorns our Abbey.-f- Here were Dr. Barlow and Sir William 
 Watson, both amongst the founders of the Institution, one 
 remembered by many of us for his zeal as a phrenologist, the 
 other deserving perpetual praise as the generous friend of 
 Herschell when he was known only as a poor musician in 
 Bath. I Here were the second Dr. Falconer and Sir George 
 Gibbes, born in the same year (J 77 1), different in many 
 respects, yet one in their love of culture ; Dr. Falconer, 
 known as Bampton Lecturer and publisher of the Oxford 
 Strabo before he graduated M.D., Sir George Gibbes not only 
 one of the foremost in founding the Institution but one of the 
 chief promoters, nearly sixty years ago, of the Society which 
 brings us here to-night. While other persons of distinction 
 social and intellectual, came to Bath occasionally, these 
 gentlemen were always here, themselves points of attraction 
 to a large number of visitors, means of intercourse between 
 many who would have been otherwise unknown, mainsprings 
 of a reputation of the place which largely made it what it is. 
 
 * Dr. Johnson died in 1644. He also published a translation of Ambrose 
 Parey's medical and surgical works, and several other botanical works, of which 
 "Iter in Agrum Cantianuvi" 1620, and ^' Ericetum Hamstedianum,''^ 
 1632, were the first local catalogues of plants published in England. — Alibone's 
 History. 
 
 t After an interval of more than a century Sibthorp came distinguished 
 like Johnson in botanical science. His father, also a physician, was Professor 
 of Botany at Oxford, to which office the son succeeded. He undertook long 
 journeys through France, Italy and Greece, to increase his knowledge of plants 
 and collect rare specimens. His death, at the early age of 38, prevented the 
 publication by himself of his "Flora Grccca," but he left an estate to the 
 University of Oxford, first to defray the expense, and then to endow a pro- 
 fessorship of Rural Economy. His " Flora Oxoniensis " was published in 1794, 
 about the time when he removed to Bath. — Britten's Bath Abbey. 
 
 X The name of Watson is an honoured one in the Boll of Bath physicians. 
 Many now living think of it with affection and gratitude in connection with 
 later times. I regret that concerning SirWiUiam Watson I glean comparatively 
 ilittle in our local annals. But there is a scientific society at Washington, U.S., 
 whose secretary has sent a recent annual report to the Bath Institution, 
 containing a complete "Bibliography of Herschell's writings," and there I find
 
 33 
 
 Of yet one more I must give a short notice. No Bath 
 physician of his day had a higher standing than the first Dr. 
 Parry, and throughout the kingdom he had great repute 
 both for his writings and practice. ^luch of his culture he 
 owed to near kindred and early associations ; his father, a 
 learned Nonconformist minister at Cirencester, being the 
 intimate friend of Earl Bathurst, who lived near, and was the 
 Maecenas of the time.* His college training he received at 
 Warrington, where the society of Dr. Aikin, his daughter 
 Mrs. Barbauld, and the Rigby family aided greatly in the 
 formation of his mind. Having begun his medical studies 
 at Edinburgh, he continued them two years in the house of 
 Dr. Denman, a friend of the Aikins and father of the Lord 
 Chief Justice. Prior to his settlement at Bath in 1779 he 
 married Miss Rigby, whose brother at Norwich and nephew 
 in London both attained medical celebrity, and who shared all 
 the high tastes of her husband. His practice, small at first as 
 usual, steadily increased until it included a list of patients 
 perhaps larger and more remarkable than that of any other 
 local practitioner in the kingdom. It was the period, 1780 
 to 1816, during which Bath was in the zenith of its fame, 
 and Dr. Parry's memoranda show that many of the British 
 nobility and most distinguished men of the time consulted 
 him. Beginning with receipts for the first year of ^^39, he 
 notes them for the fifth ^239; for the tenth ^1600, and 
 afterwards nearly ,£'3000. f There is a story that during 
 some epidemic he was returning home after a long morning's 
 
 that many of them were read as papers before the Royal Society by this Dr. 
 Watson. The titles of the papers extend through a hundred closely prioted 
 pages. The first is entered as having beea "Written by Mr. William Herschell 
 of Bath, and communicated by Dr. Watson, of Bath, F R.S., May 1780."— 
 Report of the Smithsonian Itistitution, Washington, 1880. 
 
 • See Memoir of the Rev. Joshua Parry by his grandson. Dr. C, H. Parry 
 of Bath, edited by Sir J. Eardley Wihnot, Bart., containiug the correspondence 
 of Earl Bathurst, with the subject of this notice. See also Life of Lord 
 Bathurst. — Biographia Britannica, 2nd Ed. 
 
 t Lives of British Physicians.— JfMrray, 1830.
 
 34 ■ 
 
 work when a friend remarked that his waistcoat pockets, 
 of the large fashion of the time, seemed very full, probably 
 of guineas. " Yes," he said, " I believe there are ninety-nine, 
 I may make it a round sum before I get home." Yet Dr. 
 Parry was not mercenary ; if he enjoyed success he deserved 
 it ; through a long life he studied earnestly ; he published 
 many elaborate treatises ; he cultivated music, painting 
 and literature, and he devoted much time to works of 
 benevolence and public utility. In 1782 he was elected 
 Governor of the Bath Hospital, in 1800 a fellow of the 
 Eoyal Society, in successive years a member of other learned 
 bodies at home and abroad, and lastly he was honoured with 
 the Bedford Gold Medal of the Bath and West of England 
 Agricultural Society for his varied services during thirty- 
 seven years. The land he purchased on Sion Hill, where he 
 built Summerhill, enabled him to try various minor experi- 
 ments in agriculture, while a farm he hired in the neigh- 
 bourhood gave scope for that breeding of sheep and production 
 of wool for which he was celebrated. He died in 1822, after 
 seeing his sons become worthy of their parentage, the elder 
 following the same profession in the same city, the younger 
 distinguished as a naval officer by Arctic discoveries. Dr. 
 Parry's friends caused a handsome monument to be erected 
 to his memory in the choir of the Abbey Church.* 
 
 * His family also placed a marble slab with a suitable inscription over the 
 spot inclosing the remains. — Britten's History of Bath Abbey Church, 
 
 Nearly all the medical men in the following list were interred in the Abbey. 
 A few died after the church ceased to be used as a cemetery, but were honoured 
 by some memorial here. In cases where the memorial is not visible, having 
 been probably removed for alterations, I owe the information to " Britten's 
 History of the Abbey," " Guidott's Memoirs of Physicians," and the 
 *' Antiquities of Salisbury and Bath" 
 
 Sherwood Reuben, M.D. ... 
 
 Elton Thomas, M.D. 
 
 Sherwood John, M.D. 
 
 Lapworth Edward, M.D. ... 
 
 Jorden Edward, M.D. 
 
 Ostendorph John Vincentius, M.D... 
 
 ed 1598, 
 
 aged 
 
 „ 1618, 
 
 
 „ 1620, 
 
 
 „ 1636, 
 
 „ 60 
 
 „ 1632, 
 
 „ 63 
 
 „ 1648, 

 
 35 
 
 My list is now ended. Time has not allowed me to say 
 much that would have been appropriate. Another list of 
 considerable interest might be formed of later date. I think of 
 the succession of physicians I have known and who have 
 passed away during fifty years. It would be pleasant to recall 
 their varied claims on the grateful and affectionate regard of 
 many of us who still survive. I think also of the eminent 
 surgeons who have adorned their branch of the profession, 
 and whose work in our noble hospitals deserves any tribute 
 that could be rendered. I feel, moreover, how much might 
 have been said on the recent history of medical science, 
 especially on the change that has been going on in the public 
 mind as to the nature of medical functions. For who does 
 not know that in consequence of a greater study of the 
 causes of illness, added to improved modes of treating it, the 
 
 Dauntsey John, M.D. 
 Venner Tobias, M. D. 
 Brown Thomas, M.D. 
 Baue Samuel, M.D. 
 Maplet John, M.D. 
 Stubbe Henry, W.D. 
 Guidott Thomas, M.B. 
 Peirce Robert, M.D. 
 OUver William, M.D., F.R.S. 
 
 Leigh Calvely, M.D 
 
 Baue Francis, Apothecary... 
 Bostock Eichard, M.D. 
 Shadwell Pir J., M.D., F.E.S. 
 Oliver WiUiam, M.D., F.R.S. 
 Butt John Martin, M.D., F.E.S. ... 
 
 Wall John, M.D 
 
 Sibthorp John, M.D., F.E.S. 
 Harington Henry, M.D. ... 
 Hawies Thomas, M.D., LL.D. 
 Parry Caleb HilUer, M.D., F.R S.... 
 Farrell W. B., Apothecary 
 Maycock James Dottin, M.D., F.L.S. 
 Tudor William, F.E.C.S ... 
 Bo wen William, M.D. 
 Norman George, F.R.C.S.... 
 Watson James, M.D. 
 Barlow Edward, M.D. 
 
 died 1650, 
 
 aged 80 
 
 „ 1660, 
 
 ,, 85 
 
 „ 1665, 
 
 ,, 
 
 „ 1668, 
 
 „ 80 
 
 „ 1670, 
 
 „ 55 
 
 „ 1676, 
 
 „ 48 
 
 » 1705, 
 
 „ 67 
 
 „ 1710, 
 
 „ 89 
 
 „ 1714, 
 
 „ DO 
 
 „ 1727, 
 
 ,, 45 
 
 „ 1733, 
 
 „ 56 
 
 „ 1747, 
 
 »» 
 
 „ 1747, 
 
 „ 77 
 
 „ 1764, 
 
 „ 69 
 
 „ 1769, 
 
 „ 31 
 
 „ 1776, 
 
 „ 67 
 
 „ 1800, 
 
 „ 38 
 
 „ 1816, 
 
 „ 89 
 
 „ 1820, 
 
 „ 86 
 
 „ 1822, 
 
 „ 66 
 
 „ 1829, 
 
 .. 80 
 
 „ 1835, 
 
 „ 48 
 
 „ 1845, 
 
 „ 76 
 
 „ 1845, 
 
 „ 54 
 
 „ 1861, 
 
 ,. 79 
 
 „ 1878, 
 
 „ 86 
 
 „ 1879, 
 
 ., 71
 
 36 
 
 Profession is relied upon more and more to aid in preventing 
 it ? Who has not seen in the sanitary legislation of the last 
 half century a constant multiplication of safeguards against 
 disease, an increasing recognition of a great public duty 
 devolving on vestries, corporations, boards of guardians, 
 benches of magistrates, as well as private individuals ? With 
 regard to the more obscure maladies to which we are subject, 
 I remember how eloquently Sir James Paget, at the Medical 
 International Congress last year, dwelt on the fact that the 
 frame, "so fearfully and wonderfully made," is even yet 
 imperfectly understood. " After all," he said, " the 
 subjects we have been discussing seem only to have 
 been touched upon by those who know most about them, 
 and, great as the advance in medical science has been, those 
 who come after us will probably see much greater." * 
 
 On still another topic I could have wished to say a few 
 words : the prospects of Bath as to a revival of its high 
 
 " The recent remarks of the Earl of Derby on distributing the prizes at the 
 Liverpool University College may be quoted here ; ' ' From a purely political point 
 of view there could be no doubt that the position of the medical profession had 
 greatly advanced within, say, the last hundred years ; and the growth of science, 
 of exact science, had removed the old reproach of empiricism. No man in his 
 senses could now repeat the old taunt about putting drugs of which they knew 
 little into the bodies of which they knew less. We live longer than our 
 ancestors, and he conceived that we owed this mainly to the better study of the 
 laws of health — a study closely pursued by physicians, and often pursued by 
 them at the cost of their own lives. But there was more than that. Medical 
 men were brought into the most intimate and confidential relations with every 
 class of the commmiity. We relied not only on the skill of physicians but on 
 their good faith in the most trying moments of life We trusted them implicitly. 
 No man who was not a fool would dissemble and i^revaricate with his medical 
 adviser. Medical men heard more confessions, he believed, more sincere 
 confessions, than priests ever did, and questions as great as could ever come 
 before judicial tribunals. More than that, since sanitary science had come to 
 be studied it might even be that on their courage and on their honesty the lives 
 not merely of a few but of a whole community might depend. Medical practi- 
 tioners were called upon to run risks, to say and to do unpopular things, 
 possibly for the time to forfeit the favour and gain the illwill of the socially 
 powerful, and to earn only the encomiums of the poor. In one word, they were 
 required to be gentlemen and men of honour, as well as men of science. As far 
 as he could judge, they very seldom disappointed these expectations."
 
 37 
 
 reputation. Some of us think we see signs, by no means 
 doubtful, that it will be again ere long a place largely resorted 
 to for the use of the waters. The steady increase in the 
 number of patients year by year after the erection of the new 
 baths has continued to the present time. Lately it has been 
 more and more marked, and it seems probable that the 
 interest excited by the discovery of the magnificent Roman 
 bath will not only bring visitors from a distance but lead to 
 a general inquiry why what was once so greatly prized has 
 been long so comparatively neglected. One thing is certain : 
 the revival will not find us unprepared. Not only are the 
 baths the most complete and beautiful in Europe and the 
 accommodation for visitors superior in every respect to that 
 of any former period, but we have a staff of medical men who 
 will bear comparison with those of the palmy days — men able 
 and willing to hasten the good time coming. And meanwhile 
 I hope we shall all feel that knowing how well the Bath 
 Physicians of jormer times served the city as ministers of 
 health, how faithfully they laboured not only to keep the 
 lamp alive but to make it bnrn more brightly, we ought 
 not to let their memories die.
 
 William Lewis & Son, "The Bath Herald," Nobth Gate, Bath.
 
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