His mode of relating cases which involved some important principle, showed how really interested he had been in them. A gentleman having recovered from a very serious illness, after having failed a long time in getting relief, was threatened, by the influence of the same causes, with a return of his malady. "He thought," said Abernethy, "that if he did not drink deeply, he might eat like a glutton." He lived in the country, and Mr. Abernethy one day went and dined with him. "Well," said Mr. Abernethy, "I saw he was at his old tricks again; so, being a merchant, I asked him what he would think of a man who, having been thriving in business, had amassed a comfortable fortune, and then went and risked it all in some imprudent speculation?" "Why," said the merchant, "I should think him a great ass." "Nay, then, sir," said Abernethy, "thou art the man."
On another occasion, a boy having suffered severely from disease of the hip, Abernethy had enjoined his father to remove him from a situation which he was unfitted to fill, and which, from the exertion it required, would expose him to a dangerous recurrence of his complaint. The father, however, put the boy back to his situation. One day, Abernethy met both father and son in Chancery Lane, and he saw the boy, who had a second time recovered, again limping in his walk. After making the necessary inquiry—"Sir," said he to the father, "did I not warn you not to place your son in that situation again?" The father admitted the fact. "Then, sir," said Abernethy, "if that boy dies, I shall be ready to say you are his murderer." Sure enough, the boy had another attack, and did die in a horrible condition.
This story, and others of a similar kind, were intended to impress the paramount importance of keeping diseased parts, and joints especially, in a state of perfect repose; and to prevent a recurrence of mischief, by avoiding modes of life inappropriate to constitutions which had exhibited a tendency to this serious class of diseases.
He was remarkably good on the mode of examining and detecting the nature of accidents; as fractures and dislocations. In regard to the latter, he had many very good stories, of which we will presently cite a ludicrous example. He could, however, throw in pathos with admirable skill when he desired it. The following lamentable case he used to tell to an audience singularly silent. He is speaking of the course of a large artery.
"Ah," said he, "there is no saying too much on the importance of recollecting the course of large arteries: but I will tell you a case. There was an officer in the navy, and as brave a fellow as ever stepped, who in a sea-fight received a severe wound in the shoulder, which opened his axillary artery. He lost a large quantity of blood; but the wound was staunched for the moment, and he was taken below. As he was an officer, the surgeon, who saw he was wounded severely, was about to attend him, before a seaman who had just been brought down. But the officer, though evidently in great pain, said: 'Attend to that man, sir, if you please; I can wait.' Well, his turn came; the surgeon made up his mind that a large artery had been wounded; but, as there was no bleeding, dressed the wound, and went on with his business. The officer lay very faint and exhausted for some time, and at length began to rally again, when the bleeding returned. The surgeon was immediately called, and, not knowing where to find the artery, or what else to do, told the officer he must amputate his arm at the shoulder joint. The officer at once calmly submitted to this additional, but unnecessary suffering; and, as the operator proceeded, asked if it would be long. The surgeon replied that it would soon be over. The officer rejoined: 'Sir, I thank God for it!' But he never spake more."
Amidst the death-like silence of the class, Abernethy calmly concluded: "I hope you will never forget the course of the axillary artery."
His position was always easy and natural—sometimes homely, perhaps. In the Anatomical Lecture, he always stood, and either leant against the wall, with his hands folded before him, or resting one hand on the table, with the other perhaps in his pocket. In his Surgical Lecture, he usually sat, and very generally with one leg resting on the other.
He was particularly happy in a kind of coziness, or friendliness of manner, which seemed to identify him with his audience; as if we were all about to investigate something interesting together, and not as if we were going to be "Lectured at" at all. He spoke as if addressing each individual, and his discourse, like a happy portrait, always seemed to be looking you in the face. On very many accounts, the tone and pitch of the voice, in lecturing, are important. First: That it may not be inaudible; nor, on the contrary, too loud. The one of course renders the whole useless; the other is apt to give an impression of vulgarity. We recollect a gentleman who was about to deliver a lecture in a theatre to which he was unaccustomed. He was advised to ascertain the loudness required, and to place a friend in the most distant part, to judge of its fitness; but he declined it as unnecessary. When he had given the lecture, which was a very good one, on a very interesting subject, he was much mortified in finding that he had been inaudible to at least one half of the audience.
Abernethy was very successful in this respect. His voice seldom rose above what we may term the conversational, either in pitch or tone; it was, in general, pleasing in quality, and enlivened by a sort of archness of expression. His loudest tone was never oppressive to those nearest to him; his most subdued, audible everywhere. The range of pitch was very limited; the expression of the eye, and a slight modulation of the voice being the means by which he infused through the lecture an agreeable variety, or gave to particular sentiments the requisite expression. There was nothing like declamation; even quotations were seldom louder than would have been admissible in a drawing-room. We have heard lecturers whose habitually declamatory tone has been very disagreeable; and this seldom fails to be mischievous. A declamatory tone tends to divert the attention, or to weary it when properly directed. On almost every subject, it is sure to be the source of occasional bathos, which now and then borders on the ridiculous. Conceive a man, describing a curious animal in a diagram, saying, "This part, to which I now direct my rod, is the point of the tail," in a sepulchral tone, and heavy cadence, as if he had said, "This is the end of all things." Another inconvenience often attending a declamatory tone, as distinguished from the narrative or descriptive, is the tendency it has to make a particular cadence. Sometimes we have heard lecturers give to every other sentence a peculiar fall; and this succession of rhythmical samenesses, if the lecturer be not otherwise extremely able, sends people napping.