humble friend and adviser, the bricklayer. She died in childbed in the following year, and her husband honoured her memory with a very pathetic elegy. He married again, however, in 1770. In 1776 he published his Amwell,' a descriptive poem, which was much admired in the feeble era of English poetical literature in which it appeared, but is now almost unknown. Besides the publications we have enumerated, Scott was the author of several little useful tracts on parish economy, rural laws, &c. He died in 1783. His life was written by Hoole, the translator of Tasso.

William Hunter.

BORN A. D. 1718.-DIED A. D. 1783.

THE annals of medical science do not present two more splendid names than those of the two brothers, William and John Hunter. William, the elder, was born on the 23d of May, 1718, near Kilbride, in the county of Lanark. He was at first intended for the church, and, with this view, studied divinity at the college of Glasgow for about five years. In 1737 he changed the direction of his studies, and placed himself under the tuition of the afterwards celebrated Dr Cullen, then practising surgery in the small county-town of Hamilton, about eleven miles from Glasgow. After having attended several courses of lectures at Edinburgh, and amongst others those of the elder Monro, he proceeded to London, where he obtained employment from Dr Douglas, who was then engaged in preparing a treatise on the bones, and to whom young Hunter proved a valuable acquisition, in his skill as a dissector and demonstrator.

In 1743 William Hunter contributed a paper to the Philosophical Transactions,' on the structure and diseases of the Cartilages. In 1746 he delivered a course of lectures on surgery to a society of naval surgeons. Next year he became a member of the college of surgeons, and visited the anatomical preparations of Albinus in the university of Leyden. In 1750 he obtained the degree of M.D. from the university of Glasgow.

He commenced practice in London soon after his return from Leyden. Like many of his brethren, he found his earliest and most lucrative practice in the obstetrical branch of the profession; but this department was cultivated by him with such distinguished success that he became the first physician-accoucheur in the kingdom, and was appointed physician extraordinary to the queen. How profoundly and successfully he had studied this important branch of the science appears from his splendid work entitled The History of the Human Gravid Uterus,' first published in 1775.

In 1756 he became a licentiate of the Royal college of physicians; and, on the death of Dr Fothergill, in 1781, was elected president of that learned body. In 1767 he was chosen a fellow of the Royal society, and in 1782 a foreign associate of the French academy of sciences. He pursued his laborious avocations, as a general practitioner and lecturer, with great diligence, throughout the whole course of his profes

sional life, and till within a few days of his death, which took place on the 30th of March, 1783.

William Hunter was a man of great acuteness and high original genius in his profession; a profound and sagacious observer, and laborious inquirer. He greatly enriched every department of his profession to which he more especially devoted himself. All his contributions to medical science bear the stamp of original genius, and some of his papers may be regarded as models of philosophical investigation and generalization. He entered on the study of medicine with a determination to aim at a leading place in his profession. It is related of him, that, while on a visit to his native place, after having spent some years in London, he was riding one day with his old preceptor and friend Cullen, who remarked how conspicuous an object in the landscape Long Calderwood, the birth-place of William Hunter, appeared from the point of road which they had just attained: "Yes!" exclaimed Hunter. "But, if I live, it shall be still more conspicuous!”—a prediction amply verified in the sequel of his life. In 1762 he got engaged in a sharp controversy with Dr Alexander Monro (secundus) of Edinburgh, as to the precedence of some of their respective discoveries in anatomy. The dispute divided the medical world at the time, and we shall not now attempt to determine it. On the institution of the Royal academy, the king appointed Hunter professor of anatomy in that institution; his prelections in this character were much esteemed by the students, and contributed not a little to advance the arts of painting and design in this country. In 1765 he offered to expend £7000 in the erection of an anatomical theatre; and to found a perpetual professorship of anatomy in connexion with the building, provided government would grant a site for this purpose. This liberal and patriotic offer was neglected by the ministry of the day; but Hunter purchased a piece of ground himself, and erected a spacious amphitheatre and museum upon it, at an expense which ultimately amounted to above £70,000. This museum was bequeathed to the university of Glasgow, and now forms one of the principal points of attraction in that city to literary and scientific

men.

Dr Hunter was slender in person, and rather below the middle size, but handsomely formed, and graceful in his deportment. None ever more effectually possessed the power of gaining the confidence of his patients that prime secret in the curative art.

Samuel Johnson, LL.D.

BORN A. D. 1709.-DIED a. D. 1784.

SAMUEL JOHNSON, the brightest ornament of the 18th century, was born in the city of Litchfield, in Staffordshire, on the 18th of September, 1709. His father, Michael Johnson, was a bookseller, and must have had some reputation in the city, as he more than once bore the office of chief-magistrate. By what casuistry he reconciled his conscience to the oaths required in such stations is not known; but it is certain that he was zealously attached to the exiled family, and that he instilled the same principles into the youthful mind of his son. When

Sacheverel, in his memorable tour through England, came to Litchfield, Mr Johnson carried his son-then not quite three years old-to the cathedral, and placed him on his shoulders that he might see as well as hear the far-famed preacher. But political prejudices were not the only evils which young Sam inherited by descent: from the same source he derived a morbid melancholy, which, though it neither depressed his genius nor clouded his intellect, often overshadowed him with dreadful apprehensions of insanity. From his nurse, too, he contracted scrophula, which made its appearance in him at a very early period, disfigured a face naturally well-formed, and deprived him of the sight of one of his eyes.

His first teacher was a woman who kept a school for young children. When arrived at a proper age for grammatical instruction, he was placed in the free school of Litchfield, of which one Hunter was then head-master, a man whom his illustrious pupil thought 66 very severe, and wrong-headedly severe," because he would beat a boy for not answering questions which he could not expect to be asked. He was, however, a skilful teacher, and Johnson was sensible how much he owed him; for, upon being asked how he had acquired so accurate a knowledge of the Latin tongue, he replied: My master beat me very well; without that, Sir, I should have done nothing."

66

At the age of fifteen Johnson was removed from Litchfield to a school at Stourbridge in Worcestershire, at which he remained little more than a year. He then returned home, where he staid two years without any settled plan of life, or any regular course of study. About this time, however, he read a great deal in a desultory manner; so that when, in his nineteenth year, he was entered a commoner of Pembroke college, Oxford, his mind was stored with a variety of knowledge, and Dr Adams said of him, "he was the best qualified for the university of all the young men that he had ever known come there."

6

Concerning his residence in the university, and the means by which he was supported, his two principal biographers contradict each other. According to Sir John Hawkins, the time of his continuance at Oxford is divisible into two periods; Mr Boswell represents it as only one period, with the usual interval of a long vacation. Sir John says that he was supported at college by a Mr Corbet, in the quality of assistant-tutor to his son; Boswell assures us, that, though he was promised pecuniary aid by Mr Corbet, that promise was never in any degree fulfilled. We should be inclined to adopt the knight's account of this transaction were it not palpably inconsistent with itself. He says that the two young men were entered in Pembroke on the same day;' that Corbet continued in the college two years; and yet that Johnson was driven home in little more than one year, because by the removal of Corbet he was deprived of his pension. Sir John adds, that "meeting with another source-the bounty, it is supposed, of some one or more of the members of the cathedral of Litchfield-he returned to college, and made up the whole of his residence in the university about three years." Boswell has told us nothing but that Johnson, though his father was unable to support him, continued three years at college, and was then driven from it by extreme poverty. These gentlemen differ likewise in their accounts of Johnson's tutors. Sir John Hawkins says that he had two, Mr Jordan and Dr Adams; Boswell affirms that Dr Adams could

not be his tutor, because Jordan did not quit college till 1731,-the year in the autumn of which Johnson himself was compelled to leave Oxford. Yet the same author represents Dr Adams as saying, “I was Johnson's nominal tutor; but he was above my mark:"- -a speech of which it is not easy to discover the meaning, if it was not Johnson's duty to attend Adams' lectures. Jordan was a man of such inferior abilities, that, though his pupil loved him for the goodness of his heart, yet he would often risk the payment of a small fine rather than attend his labours, nor was he studious to conceal the reason of his absence. Upon occasion of one such imposition, he said, "Sir, you have sconced me twopence for non-attendance at a lecture not worth a penny." For some transgression or absence his tutor imposed upon him as a Christmas exercise the task of translating into Latin verse Pope's Messiah. The version being shown to the author of the original, he read and returned it with this encomium: "The writer of this poem will leave it a question for posterity whether his or mine be the original." The particular course of his reading while in college, and during the vacation which he passed at home, cannot be traced. That at this period he read much we have his own evidence in what he afterwards told the king; but his mode of study was never regular, and at all times he thought more than he read. He informed Mr Boswell that what he read solidly at Oxford was Greek, and that the study he was most fond of was metaphysics.

In the year 1731 Johnson left the university without a degree. His father died in the month of December of that year, after having suffered great misfortunes in trade. Young Johnson having, therefore, not only a profession but the means of subsistence to seek, he accepted, in the month of March, 1732, the office of under-master of a free school at Market-Bosworth, Leicestershire; but, disgusted at the treatment which he received from the patron of the school, he, in a few months, relinquished a situation which he ever afterward recollected with horror. Being thus again without any fixed employment, and with very little money in his pocket, he translated and abridged 'Lobo's Voyage to Abyssinia,'' for the trifling sum, it is said, of five guineas. This was the first attempt which he made to procure pecuniary assistance by means of his pen; and it must have held forth very little encouragement to his commencing author by profession. In 1734 he returned to Litchfield, and issued proposals for an edition of Politian's Latin poems, with an historical sketch of Latin poetry from the era of Petrarch to the time of Politian. The subscription-list, however, proved inadequate to the expense of publication, and the design was abandoned. Disappointed in this scheme he next offered his services to the editor of the Gentleman's Magazine,' but did not agree upon any permanent engagement.

In 1735, being then in his twenty-sixth year, he married Mrs Porter, the widow of a mercer in Birmingham,—a lady whose age was almost double his own; whose external form, according to Garrick and others, had never been captivating, and whose fortune amounted to little more than £800. That she was a woman of superior understanding and talent is extremely probable, both because she certainly inspired him

Published in 1735 by Bettesworth & Hitch, London,

with a more than ordinary passion, and because she was herself so delighted with the charms of his conversation as to overlook his personal disadvantages, which were many and great. He now set up a private academy; for which purpose he hired a large house, well-situated, near his native city; but his name having then nothing of that celebrity which afterwards commanded the attention and respect of mankind, this undertaking did not succeed. The only pupils who are known to have been placed under his care, were the celebrated David Garrick, his brother George Garrick, and a young gentleman of fortune, whose name was Ossely. He kept his academy only a year and a half, and it was during this period of his life that he constructed the plan, and wrote a great part, of his tragedy of Irene.'

The respectable character of his parents, and his own merit, had secured him a kind reception in the best families at Litchfield. He was particularly patronized by Mr Walmsley, registrar of the ecclesiastical court,—a man of great worth and of very extensive and various erudition. This gentleman, upon hearing part of Irene' read, thought so highly of Johnson's abilities as a dramatic writer, that he advised him by all means to finish the tragedy and produce it on the stage. To men of genius the stage at this period held forth temptations almost resistless; the profits arising from a tragedy, including the representation and printing of it, and the connections which it enabled the author to form, were, in Johnson's imagination, inestimable: flattered, it may be supposed, with these hopes, he set out for London some time in the year 1737, with his pupil David Garrick, leaving Mrs Johnson to take care of the house and the wreck of her fortune. The two adventurers carried with them a warm recommendation from Mr Walmsley to Mr Colson, then master of an academy, and afterwards Lucasian professor of mathematics in the university of Cambridge; but from that gentleman it does not appear that Johnson found either protection or encouragement.

How he spent his time upon his first going to London is not particularly known. His tragedy was refused by the managers of that day; and for some years the Gentleman's Magazine' seems to have been his principal resource for employment and support. His connection with Cave, the proprietor of that periodical, ultimately became very close; he wrote prefaces, essays, reviews of books, and poems for it; and was occasionally employed in correcting the communications of other correspondents. When the complaints of the nation against the administration of Sir Robert Walpole became loud, and the famous motion was made on the 13th of February, 1740, to remove him from his majesty's councils for ever, Johnson was pitched upon by Cave to write what was entitled 'Debates in the Senate of Lilliput,' but was understood to be reports of the speeches of the most eminent members in both houses of parliament. These orations-which induced Voltaire to compare British with ancient eloquence-were hastily sketched by Johnson when he was not yet thirty-two years old, while he was little acquainted with the world, and while he was struggling not for distinction but for existence. Perhaps in none of his writings has he given a more conspicuous proof of a mind prompt and vigorous almost beyond conception; for they were composed from scanty notes taken by illiterate persons, and sometimes he had no other hints to work upon except