The Early History of Medicine in Philadelphia.
Dr. Rush that he was so sensitive to cold, that he slept "in a large night-gown, under eight blankets and a coverlet, in a stove room, for many years before he died." He applied his wit to his years, and used to say that "that physician was an impostor who did not live until he was eighty." He made it his dying request, that he might have a plain funeral, and that no bell might be tolled on the occasion, as he did not wish to disturb sick people by such unnecessary noise. His daughter, who died in 1813, bequeathed to the Pennsylvania Hospital a portrait of her father, painted by Pine, which now hangs in that building; his anatomical cabinet having been previously purchased of her by that institution for an annuity of £30, payable out of the medical fund. Dr. Coste, the chief medical officer of Rochambeau's army, in a tract which he published at Leyden, in 1784, speaks of Chovet as "a man skilled in all things pertaining to medicine, and especially in anatomy and surgery;" and the Marquis de Chastellux,[1] who was on intimate terms with Dr. Chovet when in this country in 1780, says that "many of his wax preparations were equal to those of Bologna." This traveller thus speaks
- ↑ Travels in North America, vol. i. p. 233. London, 1787.
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