But I must return from this short digression, to speak of the benefits conferred by Dr. Baillie on his profession, and particularly of his donation to the College, of which he was so distinguished an ornament.
In 1819 he presented to that body his entire collection of anatomical preparations, by far the greater number of which had been made by his own hands, and from which he had chiefly selected the splendid engravings that illustrated his work on Anatomy.
He lived only four years after this donation, when his health gradually gave way, and though a hope was entertained, that the failure of his strength might be ascribed to the fatigue of business, and that retirement would afford him relief, he sensibly and rapidly sunk, and died before he had completed his sixty-third year.
His bust is placed in the College of Physicians, and the President, on the 22d December, 1823, having announced the bequests contained in his will, consisting, amongst others, of his library, read the following observations on the medical character of his departed friend and colleague.
In the Censor’s Room.
“The same principles which guided Dr. Baillie in his private and domestic life, governed his public and professional behaviour. He was kind, generous, and sincere. His purse and his personal services were always at the command of those who could prefer a proper claim to them; and every branch of the profession met with equal attention. Nay, such was his condescension, that he often incurred great inconvenience to himself, by his punctual observance of appointments with the humblest practitioners.
“In consultation, he was candid and liberal in the highest degree; and so industriously gave credit to the previous treatment of the patient (if he could approve of it), that the physician who called him in, never failed to find himself in the same possession of the good opinion of the family as he was before the circumstances of the case had made a consultation necessary.