The Lettsomian Lectures on a Review of the Operations for Stone in the Male Bladder: Delivered before the Medical Society of London
Authors: W. F. Haslam
Journal: BMJ (1911)

Jou 347-~~~~~~~~~~~~~ space was stacked with coffins from floor to ceiling, in " most admired disorder."Some were lying east and west: some north and south: others were placed cross- wise, and some were standing up on end.Every one of these had to be taken out so that the name-plates might be read.This was a long and gruesome business, as the coffins were heavy of oak and lead, and he and the men helping him spent fifteen days over it.At last, when upwards of 200 coffins had been fruitlessly examined, there were only five left at the end of the vault; and as he could read the names on the three uppermost of these, he feared that his chance of reaching the object of his search was small.However, on one of the last two he had the satisfaction of finding the inscription, John Hunter, Esq., Died 16 October 1793 Aged 64 years.And above these words were engraved the arms of the Hunter family.Thereupon the Council of this College approached the authorities at Westminster, and asked that the body might be granted tardy burial in the Abbey.The Dean, Dr. Trench, worthily replied, " We shall be proud to be the guardians there of the ashes of so great a man."The coffin, therefore, was brought to the Abbey; and on March 28, 1859, in the midst of a crowd of illustrious persons, all that was mortal of John Hunter was laid in the earth of the North Aisle, not far from the last resting place of Isaac Newton.And as the coffin was being lowered into the vault, the organ pealed forth that magnificent chorus from Handel's Funeral Anthem, "His body is buried in peace; but his name liveth evermore I "To you, Mr. President, and to me, as to others who are devout worshippers at the Shrine of Hunter, there may appear little or nothing in this Address which is worthy of attention.Still, it may be hoped that in its course some stray thought may have been set free-as when a flint strikes steel-which, falling upon the mental tinder of some younger man, may cause the springing up in him of a flame to illuminate his studious path and help him onward.Indeed, without the hope of some such effect resulting from a Hunterian Oration, the pious intention of John Hunter's Executors might well be allowed to sink into oblivion.And even for those of us whose thoughts should be directed to the lowering of the sails of their bark, and the gathering in of the ropes, there will still remain a place in the mental vision for the picture of a raw Scottish lad coming up to a great City in which he had but one friend, and, possessing nothing beyond the rudiments of an educa- tion, seeking his way to a position in the world of Science and of Art such as it is the lot of few to attain, and, without any indebtedness to the goddess Fortune, reaching it by dint of of industry, vigour and determination.THE number of persons who visited the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew during 1910 was over three and a half millions, the largest number on record.It seems a very large number until we recollect the enormous population which lives within ten miles of the gardens, and think of the great number of persons who visit London during the spring and summer months to see the sights.Undoubtedly one of the most beautiful of these is the garden at Kew, whether it is seen in its spring or its summer dress.But the garden has a scientific as well as an aesthbtic attraction, for a great deal of important scientific and economic work is done there.Apart from growing things, the dried collections and the wonderful set of drawings of tropical