Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 12.djvu/147

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BY THOMAS SHAPTER, M.D.
139

are owing' to one who is not a member of the medical profession, and that in bringing them to a conclusion Mr. Chadwick has proved himself equal to the task so well conceived.


On the subject of medical biography we have two works, the one a life of the late Dr. James Hope, physician to Saint George's Hospital, which lays open to us the career of an arduous investigator of disease, and one on whom the principles of the Christian religion appear to have made the deepest impression; the other of Sir A. Cooper, from the pen of his nephew, Mr. B. Cooper, which though not a work of a high philosophical tone, yet abounds in amusing incidents of this distinguished man's career.


The subject of insanity has occupied much attention. In a small volume Dr. Pritchard has given us a very succinct and useful digest of his views "on the different forms of insanity in relation to medical jurisprudence," which, though ostensibly addressed to the legal profession, will be found of value to the medical man.


The admission of students to the wards of establishments set apart for lunatics, and the clinical lectures of Dr. Sutherland at Saint Luke's, are evidence that a new and enlarged system of education on mental diseases has commenced; as the reports of Dr. Couolly, of Hanwell, of Dr. Browne, of Dumfries, of Dr. Thurnain, of the Retreat, are of the extension of the more humane system of treatment which modern days have called forth.


The acquittal of M'Naughten for murder, on the plea of insanity, has aroused the indignation and excited the fears of the public for the course of public justice, and a statement of the position of the law as