Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 2.djvu/563

 undiminished, and his cares were not so accumulated as heavily to oppress him; yet, either from constant over-exertion, or a constitutional disposition to melancholy, or that consciousness, already alluded to, of possessing few popular qualities to set off his merit, his letters often bespoke a most deplorable depression of mind. Writing to me in June, 1825, of something he designed to do for the Repository, he adds, “ I am not a little glad to be obliged to do this work, for, at times, I am so depressed, that I almost could retire altogether, and ' shut the book and lay me down and die.' I have objects around me, it is true, for whose welfare I am anxious, and, to a certain degree, I have progressed in the lucrative part of my profession: but greater success has not brought' greater happiness, and I often look upon the past with sorrow, and upon the future without hope.” Yet this was written at a time when Dr. Darwall was in the fullest activity of his mind; and, communicating his thoughts to me on the subject of several undertakings proposed between us, in which he exhibited, at once, great ardour, and singular prudence and judgment. His letters, though generally written with haste, and never studied, were then, and always, full of information; and there are many portions of them which I should feel a pleasure in publishing, if I did not entertain as strong a dislike, as I know he himself felt, to any thing approaching to a violation of epistolary confidence. It was my custom, and that of several of his friends, to consult him on many and different subjects, and to refer to him the details of obscure cases met with in practice. In his replies