460 it was considered desirable that the Secre- MEDICAL NOTES IN PARLIAMENT. by competition, tary of State should have the power to allow some of the first appointments to be made by selection from some of the IN the House of Commons on Friday, the Metropolis principal medical schools ; but it was provided that at last Management and Floods Prevention Bill, so far as it related half the vacancies should be filled by competition. The word to the regulation of theatres and prevention of floods, "vacancies, of course, means the number of appointments was read a second time. Other clauses of the Bill to which which it is requisite to fill up. As a matter of fact, that was taken were objection withdrawn. power of selection has never been exercised. All the vacan- Private Bill Legislation. cies have been filled by competition ; so that in the direction of the question we have gone far beyond what the Warrant On a resolution moved Sir W. Harcourt Monday, by was requires. But I may add that there were in reality no agreed to, for the appointment of a special Committee, to vacancies to be filled in the December whom shall be referred all Private Bills Muni- half-year ending 31st, promoted by thirty medical officers having been thrown upon our hands cipal and other Local Authorities, by which it is proposed to from India; and the gentlemen who succeeded at the last create to or which powers relating police sanitary regulations examination will be appointed to future vacancies as they or are in or deviate from, extension of, repugnant to, the occur from time to time. Therefore the terms of the Warrant general law. have been more than satisfied. A petition was presented from Mile End Old Town against the Infectious Diseases Notification Bill. Deficiencies of Sight. Mr. Gibson gave notice of the following question for Obituary. Thursday, the 23rd inst., To ask the President of the Board PROFESSOR SIR WYVILLE THOMSON. of Trade whether his attention has been directed to a paper NATURALISTS and the scientific world will hear read on March 9th at the Ophthalmological Society of the generally United Kingdom, by Dr. C. E. Fitzgerald, on a case of re- with regret of the death of Sir Wyville Thomson, late markable deficiency of acuteness of vision in a seaman; and Regius Professor of Natural History in the University of whether he would state- the tests which are applied by the Edinburgh, which took place at his residence, Bonsyde, Board of Trade officials to discover the visual acuteness and on the 10th inst. Since his return in seamen and officials. Linlithgowshire, Friday, colour-sight railway from the Challenger expedition in 1876, Sir Wyville has not Dwellings of the Poor. enjoyed his previous robust health, and in June, 1879, he On Tuesday, in reply to Mr. Firth, the Home Secretary had a paralytic seizure, since which he has been unable to said he would be to confer with the hon. member and happy conduct his class in the University, or to continue the im- the President of the Board of Trade as to the of necessity work in which he was detailed further legislation to provide dwellings for the poorer classes portant engaged-the report of the results of the In in the metropolis, who were ousted from time to time by Challenger expedition. October of public improvements. The operation of the thirty-third last year he resigned his chair, and since then his health has clause of the Metropolitan Street Improvement Act was been extremely precarious. not admittedly satisfactory. Charles Wyville Thomson, the son of a surgeon in the East Dr. Kenny and Michael Davitt. India Company’s service, was born at Bonsyde, Linlithgow, on 5th of Mr. Redmond asked whether had been refused the March, 1830. He received his education at permission Mirchiston and at the with to Dr. to visit Michael Davitt in Portland Prison. Academy Edinburgh University Kenny a view to the Sir W. Harcourt in the affirmative, that entering medical profession. He, however, replied remarking a taste for he need not enter into the circumstances which made it early developed natural science, and at the age of commenced to lecture on in in his to allow Dr. to do so. He twenty-one botany King’s improper, opinion, Kenny and the was to was to allow another medical man, whose name must College, Aberdeen, following year appointed willing Marischal In was made Professor of first be submitted for to visit the Sub- College. 1853 he approval, prisoner. Natural in Cork. After Mr. Redmond notice of another on History Queen’s College, holding sequently gave question this for a he became Professor of the same for appointment year, subject Monday. Mineralogy and Geology in Queen’s College, Belfast, where The Fishmarket Question. he established a valuable natural history museum. In 1870 On Thursday, in reply to Mr. Duff, Sir G. Hogg, Chairman he succeeded Professor Allman as Regius Professor of of the Metropolitan Board of Works, stated that his attention Natural History in the University of Edinburgh. It was’ had been called to the seizure of twenty-one tons of bad fish through Sir Wyville Thomson’s instrumentality that the’ at Billingsgate last month, and to the need for increased dredging expeditions of the Lightning and Porcupine were his name is most market accommodation. When the was last dis- made in 1868 and 1869, but perhaps widely subject known famous cussed the Board decided that there was not sufficient time in connexion with the Challenger expedition which set out in 1872 under the command of Nares. to prepare a Bill for this session, but the subject was re- Captain ceiving due attention. On his return to England after an absence of three and a half years, Professor Thomson received the honour of knight. Army Veterinary Department. hood and a gold medal from the Royal Society of London. Mr. Childers replied to Major O’Beirne, that he was not Sir Wyville was also a Knight of the Swedish order of the yet able to state his decision regarding the readjustment Polar Star, an LL.D. of Aberdeen, a D.C.L. of Dublin, & of the relative rank and retiring pay for the officers of the Doctor of Philosophy of the University of Jena, a D.Sc., a Army Medical Department. Fellow of the Royal Societies of London and Edinburgh,, andaitu a Fellow-L’ t3iiU W ofUJL theLilC LinneanJLLLLUALL Society. Medical Vacancies. Besides many papers on natural science, Sir Wyville Mr. Gibson asked the Secretary of State for War whether, Thomson brought out two books on the Challenger expe" with regard to the Warrant of January, 1880, which directed dition, entitled " Voyage of the and " The " Challenger," that (8) a public and open competition shall be held twice Atlantic." The results of his previous expeditions he em- in the year, for the admission of qualified medical candidates bodied in a work called "The Depths of the Sea." Sir as probationers, and that the number of appointments so Wyville’s illness and premature death unfortunately pre- competed for shall not be less than half of the number of vented him completing what would have been the great vacancies which shall have arisen in the last completed half- work of his life, for three volumes only of the Challenger year enoing on the 30th June or 31st December," and that reports have as yet been published. The work, which is " (9) not less than half the number of vacancies shall be filled being continued under the able superintendence of Mr. up by competition," he could state how many medical vacan- John Murray, will, when completed, be a magnificent one, cies occurred in the half-year ending 31st December, 1881; and and will, it is expected, number twenty-six volumes. how many of such vacancies were filled up by competition at Sir Wyville’s straightforward, genial; and courteous dis- the last examination; and whether the terms of the Warrant, position made him a general favourite, and secured for him and the engagements it held out to candidates, had been satis- a large circle of private friends. fied.-Mr. Childers : Formerly, when the medical service was The loss of such a distinguished professor and man of not so popular as it is now, and it was difficult to fill the ranks science cannot but be a serious one for the University. 461 During Sir Wyville Thomson’s illness, the duties of the TWENTY-TWO cases of insanity are said to have professorship were ably conducted by Professor Alleyne resulted in France from the recent financial panic. of Nicolson St. Andrews. THE committee of the North Cambs Cottage have received from Miss Peckover a sum sufficient WILLIAM MILLER F.R.C.S. ENG. Hospital COULTATE, to maintain one bed in the institution. WE have this week to record the death of William Miller THE annual dinner of the West London Hospital at Lan- Coultate, F.R.C.S. Eog., aged sixty-eight, Burnley, will be held at Willis’s Rooms on May 17th, under the cashire, where he had been in practice since 1836. The presidency of the Duke of Manchester, K.P. deceased was the son of a surgeon who practised in the same AT the first meeting of the Board of Delegates of town. He completed his medical studies in Dublin ; was the Hospital Saturday Fund, Mr. S. Morley, M.P., was re- possessed of great natural abilities, which he had carefully elected president, and the 2nd of September was fixed for cultivated; and his information on many subjects, outside the collection of the fund for the present year.