AUGUST 1919. EDINBURGH MEDICAL JOURNAL. EDITORIAL NOTES. In the Senate Hall of the University on 11th Th^ma^R^Fraser* J11^) Emeritus Professor Sir Thomas R. Fraser was presented with his portrait, painted by Mr. Robert Home. The Principal, Sir Alfred Ewing, presided over a large gathering of Sir Thomas's former students, academic colleagues, and personal friends. Prof. Harvey Littlejohn, Hon. Secretary of the Committee who had arranged for the presentation, intimated apologies from many of Sir Thomas's friends and pupils, including Prof. Crum Brown, Prof. John Chiene, Prof. Matthew Hay, and Sir W. Watson Cheyne, M.P. Sir Alfred Ewing said that Sir Thomas Fraser was a professor in the University when he (Sir Alfred) was still an undergraduate, and in the long interval that had passed since then his services to scientific medicine had been such that his life might well be summed up in the phrase, " A Chapter of Medical History "?a chapter the end of which he rejoiced to think was not yet. Sir James Affleck, in handing over the portrait on behalf of the subscribers, said :? " When Sir Thomas Fraser recently retired from his Chair it was felt by his colleagues, former pupils, and friends, that this event could not in be allowed to pass without some tangible expression of the esteem which he was held, and of their sense of the splendid service he had rendered to the University and Medical School, the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh, and indeed to the whole world of medicine, for the long period of over forty years. " Accordingly the matter was taken in hand by a Committee, and an effort was made to induce Sir Thomas to sit for his portrait, which was happily successful, and the work was placed in the hands of an artist who proved to be in perfect sympathy with his subject. " of It would ill become me in his presence to use the language adulation; but there are facts, and impressions, and memories which cannot be omitted from notice on an occasion like this. K. M. J. VOL. XXIIT. NO. II. 6 74 Editorial Notes " From the outset of his career Sir Thomas Fraser's work proclaimed him marked out for great things in his profession, and the years which followed fully justified that anticipation ; so that when in 1877 he was called to succeed his great master, Sir Robert Christison, in his Chair, the whole medical world approved the choice. "It is impossible for me at this time to enter into details of Sir Thomas Fraser's work as a professor and investigator (even were I competent to do so) further than to state that the fruit of that work produced important contributions to the therapeutic resources of the * physician which have stood the test of time, and will always be associated with his name, and which moreover shed a lustre on our University. " Sir Thomas Fraser's work in the Royal Infirmary (with which as one of his colleagues I was well acquainted) proved him to be a physician and clinical teacher of the first order, and thousands of his students, who during his long service there passed through his hands, are to-day in all parts of the world, putting in practice the precepts of thorough- ness, accuracy, and honesty in the investigation and treatment of disease, of which he himself was so conspicuous an example in all his own work. " In all he undertook he gave the impression of the scientific spirit and the mind of the seeker after truth. " Whatsoever his hand found to do?and it found plenty?he did with all his might, and difficulties only served to stimulate to increased effort. " But the energies of Sir Thomas Fraser were not limited merely to the duties of his Chair. The numerous and important positions he was called on to fill?Member of the University Court, Member of the General Medical Council (where he did excellent work in the cause of medical education), President of the Royal College of Physicians, Edinburgh, President of the Indian Plague Commission, and other appointments under the Crown?are but a few examples. They bore testimony to him as a man of affairs in whom professional and public confidence could be reposed. "Honours and distinctions from Universities and from learned s Societies, both at home and abroad, came in abundance; while his knighthood, and especially his appointment as Honorary Physician to His Majesty the King in Scotland, were gratifying acknowledgments of his eminent merits. " Those who know Sir Thomas only as a scientific worker knew but part of the man and little realised how behind that weight of scientific learning there lay a genial and warm heart, which was revealed mostly to those who enjoyed his intimate friendship. "These few halting words of mine convey but an inadequate im- pression of the man whom we have to-day met to honour, and the only reason for complying with the request that I should occupy the position L_ Editorial Notes 75 I do in this interesting ceremony is that I am perhaps the only one available among his old and intimate friends to undertake the duty which I have done with singular pleasure. " That duty I should not consider discharged did I not in a word refer to the gentle lady who has been his companion through all his active and strenuous life. Lady Fraser has throughout been an unfailing strength to his heart, and, amid all the difficulties, the vicissitudes, and the trials through which they have been called to pass, has proved, by her courage, her sympathy, and her sweetness, a true helper and made it possible for him to do the work he has done. " It only remains for me to ask you, Sir Thomas, to accept this portrait from your friends as a mark of their appreciation of your work and a token of their affectionate esteem." In acknowledging the presentation, Sir Thomas Fraser said :? " Although I cannot pretend to be unaccustomed to address audiences, I confess I have had a great difficulty in finding words adequate to express my feelings of profound gratitude for this most valued expression of the great kindness of many of my friends. "It forms the culmination of many kindnesses I have received during my exceptionally long professional and academic career of between forty and forty-five years, in which, I may be permitted to say, my life has not been an inactive one. " This long tenure appears to be almost one of the characteristics of the Professorship of Materia Medica. My immediate predecessor, Sir Robert Christison, filled the Chair for forty-five years, having previously been Professor of Medical Jurisprudence for ten years. " It has possibly the advantage of giving time to add experience to experience, which may be of value to a teacher and also to an experimenter, so long as enthusiasm survives. " It has allowed me to take a share in the training of between 6000 and 7000 men, who constitute as a body the best qualified practitioners of medicine and surgery in the British Empire. "It has given me the opportunity, often in conjunction with Sir William Turner, of defending, in the lobbies of the Houses of Parliament, several important University privileges rendered precarious in Parliamentary Bills; of taking a suggesting and pro- moting part?especially when, for twenty years, I held the office of Dean of the Faculty of Medicine?in the remarkable expansion of the University which may be illustrated in the part I have taken in founding Lectureships on Ophthalmology, Diseases of the Throat and Ear, on Sick Children's Diseases, Tropical, Infectious, and Venereal Diseases, on the History of Medicine, on Physical Therapeutics, and on Practical Pharmacology, and the institution of diplomas in connection with several of them. Apart from the above lecturers, there are now 76 Editorial Notes fifty-nine or sixty associated with the Faculty of Medicine, whereas none are recorded in the Calendar of 1878-79. " Practical instruction has simultaneously extended, so that it even threatens to supersede instruction by lectures; but it should not be overlooked that a course of lectures is indispensable for the broad and academic conception of almost every subject, while for such lecture- courses large classes are not objectionable, but rather advantageous by stimulating both the teacher and the audience. " Perhaps, above all, during the last twenty years there has been a recognition of the high academic and professional value of original research, and in all medical departments it is being seriously engaged in; whereas, at the time of my appointment, it was almost totally unprovided for, both in accommodation and equipment, and was regarded as an amateurish occupation or dissipation, which did not possess any educational value. "In the Royal Infirmary?my other important sphere of official work?the expansions have also been great. They may be illustrated by the statement that there were no assistant physicians until 1869, when Dr. Muirhead was with me honoured by being the first appointed to this office: whereas there are now eight assistant physicians on constant duty ; and that, while the first assistant physicians, besides their other duties, had charge of the fever patients, comprehending all the fever cases in Edinburgh, these patients are no longer received into the Infirmary, but are treated in a special city hospital. "This long tenure has given me the opportunity likewise of engaging in several branches of research and observation in Medicine and Materia Medica. At the danger of being egotistical, I would venture to mention especially such work as that which led to the discovery in physostigma of the first substance found capable of con- tracting the pupil, now in everyday use by the ophthalmologist.