These notes of Harvey's visceral lecture are of especial value to us though they are a mere skeleton of the course--a skeleton which he was accustomed to clothe with facts drawn from his own vast stores of observation, with the theories of all his great predecessors and with the most apposite illustrations. Fortunately they deal with the thorax and its contents so that they show us the exact point which he had reached in connection with his great discovery of the circulation of the blood and the true function of the heart. The notes therefore are interesting reading quite apart from the peculiarities of their style.
Harvey was so good a Latin scholar, and during his stay in Italy had acquired such a perfect colloquial knowledge of the language that it is clear he thought with equal facility in Latin or in English, so that it is immaterial into which language he put his ideas. He uses therefore many abbreviations, and whole sentences are written in a mixture of Latin and English, which always sounds oddly to our unaccustomed ears, and often seems comical. Thus, in speaking of the lungs and their functions, he says, "Soe curst children by eager crying grow black and suffocated _non deficiente animali facultate_," and in speaking of the eyes and their uses, he says, "Oculi eodem loco, viz., Nobilissimi supra et ante ad processus eminentes instar capitis in a Lobster ... snayles cornubus tactu pro visu utuntur unde occuli as a Centinell to the Army locis editis anterioribus." Sometimes he embodies an important experimental observation in this jargon as in the example, "Exempto corde, frogg scipp, eele crawle, dogg Ambulat."
The more important and original ideas throughout the notes are initialled WH., and this seems to have been Harvey's constant practice, for it occurs even in the books which he has read and annotated, whilst to other parts of his notes he has appended the sign [Greek: D].
The lectures were partly read and partly oral, and we know from the minute directions laid down by the Barber Surgeons Company the exact manner in which they were given. The "Manual of Anatomy," published by Alexander Reid in 1634, has a frontispiece showing that the method of lecturing adopted in England was the same as that in use throughout Europe. The body lay upon a table, and as the dissections were done in sight of the audience, the dissecting instruments were close to it. The lecturer, wearing the cap of his doctor's degree, sate opposite the centre of the table holding in his hand a little wand[2] to indicate the part he mentions, though in many cases the demonstration was made by a second doctor of medicine known as the demonstrator, whilst the lecturer read his remarks. At either end of the table was an assistant--the Masters of the Anatomy--with scalpel in hand ready to expose the different structures, and to clear up any points of difficulty. The audience grouped themselves in the most advantageous positions for seeing and hearing, though in some cases places were assigned to them according to age and rank.