What the doctor thought / by Sir James Crichton-Browne.

  • James Crichton-Browne
Date:
1930
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: What the doctor thought / by Sir James Crichton-Browne. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    39/292 (page 35)
    JAMES MACDONALD March 8, 1879.—I was a pall-bearer at the funeral to-day at Beckenham Churchyard of my friend James Macdonald, who in sixteen years climbed up the steep stair of journalism from an occasional writer in Aberdeen, while holding a clerkship there, to a leading post on the staff of The Times, and was a Providence to his family all the way. The strain of the ascent killed him in his prime. He has died suddenly in his thirty-eighth year. He was a brilliant writer. His articles sparkled, not with literary tinsel, but with intel¬ lectual percussion, were precise but fluent, learned but clear. He had a masterly grasp of French poli¬ tics, which he had made a special study, and brought analytic power to bear on every subject he handled. And he was modest and gentle withal, and made many friends, his Highland blood being subdued by his liberal culture and the stern disci¬ pline he had undergone. He leaves a little gap even in big and thickset London. 1879.—Mr. Kerr, one of the ablest of our school inspectors, told me of a dinner which was held in Edinburgh some years ago, at which a number of the distinguished men of the city were present, and at which the question was asked whether there was a man at the table who could lay his hand on his heart and say he had never been tipsy. There was no response, and at last an eminent divine, who happened to be of the company, spoke up and said : “ I should like to explain why I cannot make