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duty which has devolved upon me is not unmingled with pain. If it is instructive to dwell upon the merits of that great Name which has to-day assembled us together, if it is agreeable to trace the steps of genius forcing its way from utter oblivion into the meridian blaze of fame, until it has become impossible to discuss the science of surgery without pronouncing the name of John Hunter, it is with regret that we must recount the losses which we have recently sustained, the gaps not easily filled up which death has made in our ranks.

At our last anniversary we had to deplore the loss of Sir Astley Cooper—a man for whom scarcely any panegyric can be too strong, since his fame, as a practical surgeon, was limited only by the boundaries of the civilized world.