Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/722

NAME LEWIS 700 LEWIS when properly organized, to hinder the illiter- ate medicaster and ignorant quacks from in- troducing themselves into the practice, to the danger of the lives of the sick and the injury of the deserving physician." This ■ excellent oration closed with a plea to the members to elevate the pharmaceutical standards of the druggists and to stand together for the public good, to concur in all measures calculated to abolish all odious distinctions and ill-natured competitions among the faculty and to culti- vate confidence and harmony in the profession. He settled in Lenox as early as 1778, took an important part in town affairs, assisted in establishing the first town library, and pub- lished one of the earliest newspapers in the county, a political campaign sheet. He was a good scholar and a forceful writer and speak- er besides being a successful practitioner. Af- ter living in Lenox for over a quarter of a century, he moved to New York State in 1810 and died there in 1825. Yale conferred her A. M. on him in 1788 and Williams in 1806. The Founding of the Berkshire District Medical Society, W. L. Burrage, M.D., Boston Medical and Surg. Jour., Nov. 22, 1917. Lewis, Francis West (1825-1902) Medical annals and medical libraries would be searched in vain for the professional and literary achievements of Francis W. Lewis, son of Mordecai D. and Sarah West Lewis, but the Children's Hospital on Twenty-second Street in Philadelphia is a fine monument to a man who gave his best years to lightening the burden of suffering childhood. He himself, when only seven, went to Bron- son Alcott's School in Germantown, after- wards to Bishop Hopkins' Institute at Bur- lington, Vermont, graduating from the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania at eighteen and tak- ing his M. D. at Jefferson .Medical College in 1846 and becoming a fellow of the College of Physicians in 1855. Two years were then spent partly in study- ing ophthalmology under Sir William Wilde in Dublin and afterwards in work at the Sal- petriere, Paris, a varied experience to end in an appointment of resident physician at the Pennsylvania Hospital. The cares, two years later, of a large pri- vate practice among the Philadelphia poor drew on his strength and he made frequent voyages abroad, but during these and while he was tending sick soldiers in the Satterlee Hospital, Philadelphia, or in the temporary military hospital in Harrisburg he had one cherished hope — that of giving sick children a hospital all to themselves. Finally, in 1855, aided by Dr. Penrose and Dr. Bache, a small house furnished with twelve beds was opened in Blight Street, Phil- adelphia, and Dr. Lewis' love for his new work as physician there grew ever greater, though somewhere between the years of 1866 and 1868 he had given up practising. He prized nothing more than his welcome from the children when he went into the wards. A broad minded philanthropist, a lover of natural science and art, a great reader and a good friend, Dr. Lewis with his two sisters helped onwards the well-being of their native town, but one cold night in February, 1902, a day of severe blizzard, he received his death blow from pneumonia because he would at- tend the Charity Organization meeting, his death taking place the same month. Trans. Coll. of Phys., Pa., 1903, vol. xxv. Universities and Their Sons, Penn., 1902. Lewis, Samuel (1813-1890) Samuel Lewis was a book collector "who possessed a steady and intelligent generosity out of all proportion to the size of an income never more than moderate" — this opinion of him by S. Weir Mitchell (q. v.). He was born in Barbados, November 16, 1813, came to Philadelphia with his uncle and guardian, the Rev. Prescott Hinds, when not quite twenty-one and in the fall of the same year matriculated at the University of Pennsylvania. After one year he went to Edin- burgh and matriculated there, first experienc- ing a severe attack of small-pox owing to non- vaccination while in the Indies, and being giv- en a patient, who had died of the disease, to dissect. After recovery he became dresser to the celebrated Syme, professor of clinical sur- gery in Edinburgh. For a while he stayed in London, then on to Dublin, returning to Edinburgh in 1840 and taking his M. D. there. The same year he went back again to Phila- delphia and entered active practice besides helping Dr. Hollingsworth edit The Medical Examiner. He was closely attached to all medical interests but was most of all anxious to improve the college library and in 1864 pre- sented to it his private library of 2,500 care- fully selected volumes, thus making the college collection the best in the state. He valued books for their historical association and their utility rather than their rarity, though he loved also a beautiful book. His greatest happiness lay in adding to his gift, until the numbers exceeded 10,(X)0, including an unequalled col- lection of the School of Salerno. It formed part of his holidays in Europe to buy col- lections, and if any friend craved a book, to supply the library with it. Equally generous with his money, he was a friend to many in