Page:History of Adelaide and vicinity.djvu/347

 Professor E. C. Stirling ADELAIDE AND VICINI'J'Y Lecturer on Physiology, at that institution. He was also elected Surgeon tf) the Helgrave Hospital for Sick Children. These positions Dr. Stirling resigned in 1881, and, returning to the land of his birth, he was very shortly afterwards elected Lecturer on Physiology at the Adelaide University — a position which he held until 1900, when the Lecture.shij) was converted into a Professorship, Dr. Stirling being then appointed to the new Chair. In his position as a member of the Council of the University, he has taken a prominent share in the foundation of the Medical School which has been .so liberally endowed by the late Sir Thomas Elder. As a teacher he has taken a large and active share in its work ever since its establishment. Having been ap|)ointed SurgecMi to the Adelaide Hospital soon after his arrival in South Australia, he eventually became Senior Surgeon, and held that position until the resignation of the whole medical staff took place at the time of the Hospital dispute. Appointed in 1882, Dr. Stirling was for many years a member of the Hcjard of Governors of the Public Library, Museum, and Art Ciallery, and he now occupies the position of Director of the Museum, which owes much to his management. He was appointed first President of the State Children's Department on its establishment as an independent institution, and this position he held for two years. In medical matters he has taken a prominently active part, having been President of the South Australian branch of the British Medical A.ssociation. In 1887 he was elected, though he did not serve, as President of the first Intercolonial Medical Congress, held in Adelaide. In the following year he was nominated, and acted, as President of the Section of Surgery at the Congress held in Melbourne. With Dr. Paterson, he represented South Australia in 1888 on a Royal Commission held in Sydney with the object of ascertaining how far it miglrt be possible to apply the dissemination of infective diseases (particularly Pasteur's chicken cholera) to the destruction of rabbits. In 1892 he was elected corresponding member of the Royal Zoological Society of London ; and in the same year received a gold medal from the Queen Regent of Holland for "services to science." The following year he received the signal honor of election as a Fellow of the Royal Society of England. He has been President of the Royal Society of South Australia, and is the author of many scientific works and papers in connection with that body, the Royal Zoological Society of London, the Intercolonial Medical Congresses, the British Medical Association, and several other societies. Professor Stirling's scientific work has not been entirely confined to the laboratory, for in 1892 he accompanied Lord Kintore on his journey across the continent from Port Darwin to Adelaide; and in 1891. he took i)art in the work of the Horn exploring expedition to Central Australia as medical officer and anthropologist, embodying the results of his labors in a paper which forms part of the published report of that expedition. His name is perhaps best known in connection with the remarkable blind marsupial mole, Notoryctes typh/ops, discovered at Idracowra Station, on the Finke, by Mr. J. F. Bishop, which his description in the " Proceedings of the Royal Society of .South Australia " first made known to the scientific world. His name, in conjunction with that of Mr. Zietz, will also be remembered in connection with a discoery at Lake Callabonna (originally made some years ago by Mr. Ragless) of an immense deposit of fossil bones. These included
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