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72 HUNTER periments, and was constantly performing op- erations then now to the art of surgery. Soon after his attack in 1785 he practised the new method of tying the artery for popliteal aneu- rism, which has been called the most brilliant surgical discovery of the century. In 1786 appeared his " Treatise on the Venereal Dis- ease" (4to, London; new ed. by Sir Everard Home, 1809, and by Joseph Adams, 1818), and "Observations on Certain Parts of the Animal Economy" (4to, London; new ed. by Prof. Owen, 1800, 1837), the latter a re- publication of papers from the " Philosophical Transactions," and of others on anatomical and physiological discoveries by the author. In the same year he was appointed surgeon general of the army, and in 1787 he received the Copley gold medal from the royal society for papers on the ovarinm, the specific identity of the wolf, jackal, and dog, and on the struc- ture and economy of whales. Soon after he published valuable papers on the treatment of inflamed veins, on introsusception, and on the mode of conveying food into the stomach in cases of paralysis of the oesophagus; and in 1792 he contributed his last paper to the " Phi- losophical Transactions," entitled "Observa- tions on the Economy of Bees." In this year he resigned his lectureship at St. George's hos- pital, and devoted himself to the completion of his work on inflammation. On Oct. 16, 1793, while attending a meeting of the board of directors of St. George's hospital, he became violently excited by a remark made to him by one of his colleagues, and leaving the room instantly expired. As a surgical operator John Hunter was undoubtedly one of the greatest men of his time. As an anatomist and phys- iologist, he displayed a keenness of intellect, a faculty of generalization, and a philosophic turn of uiind, which must rank him among the greatest of modern natural philosophers, and of which he has left an enduring monument in the celebrated museum named after him, and in 1799 purchased by the nation and placed in the keeping of the college of surgeons. At the time of his death it contained more than 10,000 preparations illustrating human and comparative anatomy, physiology, pathology, and natural history, so arranged as to exhibit the gradations of nature from the simplest form of life up to man. The physiological se- ries, which comprised considerably more than half the collection, contained 1,000 skeletons, 3,000 animals and plants illustrating natural history (the animals stuffed or preserved in spirits), and 1,200 fossils, besides monsters and other eccentric forms of animal life. He left in addition 19 MS. volumes of materials for a catalogue of his museum, the preparation of which occupied him during the last few years of his life. The completion of the work was assigned to Sir Everard Home, his executor, who was intrusted for that purpose with the ten most valuable volumes, which he subse- quently burned, in accordance, as he said, with Hunter's express desire ; although there is little doubt that ho destroyed them to conceal his own appropriation of their contents in the prep- aration of the anatomical papers which pass under his name. After his death appeared his 'Treatise on the Blood, Inflammation, and Gun-shot Wounds," preceded by a biography by Sir Everard Home (4to, 1794); and in 1835-'7 his surgical works; with notes by J. F. Palmer, were published in 4 vols. 4to, with an atlas of 60 plates. Biographies of him have- also been published by Jesse Foot (8vo, 1794) and Joseph Adams (8vo, 1816). His remains, after a repose of more than half a century under the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, were in March, 1859, disentombed by the royal college of surgeons, and on the 28th of the month deposited with much ceremony in West- minster abbey, next to the remains of Ben Jonson. His wife, ANNE HOME HUNTEK (born in 1741, died in 1821), published in 1802 n volume of poems, several of which were set to music by Haydn. HOTTER, Robert Slereer Taliaferro, an Ameri- can statesman, born in Essex co., Va., April 21, 1809. He graduated at the university of Virginia, studied law, and commenced practice in 1830. Having served in the Virginia house of delegates, he was in 1837 elected to congress, and in 1839 chosen speaker of the house of rep- resentatives. He was defeated in 1 843, but re- elected in 1845. In 1846 he was chosen sena- tor in congress, taking his seat in December, 1847. In 1849 he was made chairman of the committee on finance, which post he held until the opening of the civil war. In the mean while he bore a large part in the political dis- cussions of the day. In 1860 he was a promi- nent candidate for the democratic nomination to the presidency, receiving upon several bal- lots in the convention at Charleston the next highest vote to that for Mr. Douglas. He took a leading part in the secession movement, and according to the original scheme was to have been president of the new government, Jetferson Davis to be commander-in-chief of the army. He was formally expelled from the United States senate in July, 1861. The confederate plan had been changed, Davis having been made president, and Robert Toombs secretary of state. Toombs was soon superseded by Hun- ter, and he in a short time by Judah P. Ben- jamin. Hunter, having been elected senator from Virginia, was classed in the opposition to the administration of Davis. In February, 1865, Hunter, Stephens, and Campbell were appointed peace commissioners to meet Presi- dent Lincoln and Mr. Seward upon a vessel in Hampton Roads. The conference was futile, Lincoln refusing to treat upon the basis of rec- ognizing the independence of the confederacy. A war meeting was then held in Richmond, over which Hunter presided, and resolutions were passed to the effect that the confederates would never lay down their arms until they should have achieved their independence.