Page:Memoir of George B. Wood, M. D., LL.D.djvu/18

 the medical profession, that the neediest practitioner, lecturer or author among them all, seldom worked so hard, and so incessantly, as Dr. Wood. The motives which sustained him in these laborious habits, were, evidently, not at all a desire to accumulate farther wealth, but a love for his pursuits, per se; a very earnest purpose of usefulness to his fellow-men; and, it may be, a not ignoble valuation of his own reputation.

Although without offspring, the companionship of his excellent wife was to him a constant source of happiness, until her death in 1865. With this loss, following that of Dr. Bache in 1864, began the decline of Dr. Wood's vigor, which slowly, and almost insensibly, proceeded, until his decease in the Spring of 1879.

In 1847, before his transfer to the Professorship of Practice of Medicine in the University, he published his great treatise, in two volumes, on the Practice of Medicine. This was at once recognized, at home and abroad, as an authoritative work. It became a favorite text-book for students, not only in this country, but also in Great Britain. The time-honored University of Edinburgh was one of several foreign medical schools in which it was officially approved and adopted. It passed, during its author's life, through six editions.

This work was followed, in 1856, by another, also in two octavo volumes, a treatise upon Therapeutics and Pharmacology. Of this, three editions were issued; the last in 1868. In both of these works, Dr. Wood showed the most indefatigable industry and excellent