Page:The Harveian oration, delivered before the Royal College of Physicians, Wednesday, June 27th, 1877 (IA b22314623).pdf/20

 printing or verifying some of the allusions and references, the transcript and translation of the portion that particularly concerns us, relating to the heart and circulation, inevitably leaves much to be desired. * I may say that this section occupies a little more than 15 pages of the volume, comprising altogether 441 lines.

The notes are put together in an aphoristic manner, and are occasionally interpolated with English words for which the writer, at the moment of composition, was unable at once to supply the corresponding Latin term. There are frequent references to other authors; Hippocrates, Galen, Columbus, Versallius (sic), Colsius, Aquapendens, and one, though this is doubtful, to Cæsalpinus. Every now and then we meet with initials W. H., appended, probably, for the purpose of distinguish- ing the passage as one that the speaker wished to mark as belonging especially to himself. The notes show that Harvey had, at that time, already studied the subject by vivisection, and that he had employed a variety of animals for his inquiry. But one feels throughout that he is still some- what influenced by the prevailing views, and that he is only laboriously attaining that clear insight

satisfactory results; and, after submitting it to more competent Latin scholars than I profess to be, I fear others would not be much more successful. It would probably be wisest to publish the notes in autotype, with an accompanying transcript, and allow each reader to be his own interpreter.
 * The attempt I have made in translating it has not yielded