Glasgow to Edinburgh during the year in which Mr Bell entered the university. His lectures and experiments proved generally attractive, and powerfully interested the mind of Mr Bell. Dr Cullen was professor of the Institutes of Medicine, and his original genius excited the greatest ardour amongst the students. The practice of medicine was taught by Dr John Gregory, and Botany by Dr John Hope. These were the professors whom Mr Bell attended, and it must be confessed, that they were men of distinguished talents, whose lectures no diligent student could listen to without deriving very great advantage.
Mr Bell had resolved, in 1770, to visit Paris and London, the two great schools for surgical practice. Before doing so, however, he passed the examinations at Surgeon's Hall, and was admitted a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh. In those great cities he remained nearly two years, assiduously improving himself in surgery. Returning to his native country in 1772, he commenced business in Edinburgh. Few came better prepared than he did for the practice of surgery. His education was liberal and extensive. His appearance was much in his favour. His address was good, his manner composed and sedate. Mr Bell had early formed the plan of composing a system of surgery and this he at last accomplished. He did not publish the whole work at once; but in the year 1778, about six years after he bad finally settled in Edinburgh, and become established in practice, the first volume was given to the world. The remaining volumes appeared from time to time until the work was completed in six volumes 8vo. in 1788. In 1793, appeared his "Treatise on Gonorrhoea," and in 1794, another "Treatise on Hydrocele," which is understood to be the least popular of his works.
Mr Bell married, in 1776, Miss Hamilton, daughter of Dr Robert Hamilton, professor of divinity in the University of Edinburgh, by whom he had a numerous family. He died, April 4, 1806.
BELL, Henry, the first successful applier of steam to the purposes of navigation in Europe, was born at Torphichen in Linlithgowshire, April 7, 1767. He was sprung from a race of mechanics, being the fifth son of Patrick Bell and Margaret Easton, whose ancestors, through several descents, were alike well-known in the neighbourhood as ingenious mill-wrights and builders; some of them having also distinguished themselves in the erection of public works, such as harbours, bridges, &c., not only in Scotland, but also in the other divisions of the United Kingdom. Henry Bell, after receiving a plain education at the parish school, began, in 1780, to learn the handicraft of a stone-mason. Three years after, he changed his views in favour of the other craft of the family, and was apprenticed to his uncle, who practised the art of a mill-wright. At the termination of his engagement, he went to Borrowstounness, for the purpose of being instructed in ship-modelling, and, in 1787, he engaged with Mr James Inglis, engineer at Bell's Hill, with the view of completing his knowledge of mechanics. He afterwards went to London, where he was employed by the celebrated Mr Rennie; so that his opportunities of acquiring a practical acquaintance with the higher branches of his art, were altogether very considerable.
About the year 1790, Bell returned to Scotland, and it is said that he practised for several years, at Glasgow, the unambitious craft of a house-carpenter. He was entered October 20, 1797, as a member of the corporation of wrights in that city. It was his wish to become an undertaker of public works in Glasgow; but either from a deficiency of capital, or from want of steady application, he never succeeded to any extent in that walk. "The truth is," as we have been informed, "Bell had many of the features of the enthusiastic projector; never calculated means to ends, or looked much farther than the first stages or movements of any scheme. His mind was a chaos of extraordinary projects, the most of which, from his want of accurate
