Page:Stryker's American Register and Magazine, Volume 6, 1851.djvu/237

Rh At Philadelphia,, aged 52, the celebrated physician and craniologist. The following account of him is from a Memoir read to the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences by Dr. Charles D. Meigs, who was intimately acquainted with Dr. Morton:

"Samuel George Morton was born in Philadelphia on the 26th of January, 1799. His father was a native of Ireland, and died when the subject of this memoir was only six months old. His mother was a Philadelphian by birth. After her husband's death, she removed to West Farms, near the City of New York, and joined the Society of Friends, into which, at her request, her children also were admitted. In 1817 he lost his mother, which occasioned him the deepest grief, as he was most ardently attached to her. In the autumn of the same year, he accidentally got possession of a copy of Dr. Rush's 'Sixteen Introductory Lectures,' which he read with great delight. His mind was now made up to devote himself to the profession of medicine. He became a student in the office of Dr. Joseph Parrish, and attended medical lectures in the University of Pennsylvania. He received the degree of M.D. in 1820, and was the same year elected a member of the Academy of Natural Sciences, of which he was President at the time of his death. He was not yet satisfied with the medical education which he had received. He therefore sailed for Europe; and on the 20th of October, 1820, entered the University of Edinburgh, where he subsequently graduated.

"In 1826, Dr. Morton commenced practice in Philadelphia. He renewed his connection with the Academy of Natural Sciences, which, at that time, numbered among its members several distinguished names. He soon afterwards wrote a number of scientific essays. That on 'Crania Ægyptiaca' greatly enlarged his reputation abroad, and won the esteem of distinguished scholars. To Professor Silliman's "American Journal of Science and Art," he made valuable contributions.

"He early began to make his now celebrated collection of crania, with great labor and toil, and inconvenient cost. He investigated organic remains, and explained problems in Zoology and Ethnology; he published valuable treatises on Consumption, on the Science of Anatomy, and on the Practice of Physic; he served the city gratuitously as physician to the alms-house and hospital; and he delivered courses of lectures in the Pennsylvania Medical College, where he was Professor of Anatomy.

"Unaided and alone, from his own pecuniary resources, which were never abundant, overwhelmed with professional business, often in miserable health and in danger of death. Dr. Morton had, so far back as 1840, collected and arranged a cabinet of 867 human