His appearance and manner in this early portion of his life are thus described by his intimate friend, Edward Gardner: “His height was rather under the middle size, his person was robust, but active and well formed. In his dress he was peculiarly neat, and everything about him showed the man intent and serious, and well prepared to meet the duties of his calling. When I first saw him it was on Frampton Green. I was somewhat his junior in years, and had heard so much of Mr. Jenner of Berkeley that I had no small curiosity to see him. He was dressed in a blue coat and yellow buttons, buckskins, well-polished jockey-boots, with handsome silver spurs, and he carried a smart whip with a silver handle. His hair, after the fashion of the times, was done up in a club, and he wore a broad-brimmed hat. We were introduced on that occasion, and I was delighted and astonished. I was prepared to find an accomplished man, and all the country spoke of him as a skilful surgeon and a great naturalist; but I did not expect to find him so much at home on other matters. I who had been spending my time in cultivating my judgment by abstract study, and smit from my boyhood with the love of song, had sought my amusement in the rosy fields of imagination, was not less surprised than gratified to find that the ancient affinity between Apollo and Esculapius was so well maintained in his person.” So informing and yet witty, so full of life, so true to life was his conversation that the chance of sharing it was eagerly embraced, and his friends rode many miles to accompany him on his way home from their houses, even at midnight. His poetical fancy occasionally vented itself in little pieces of verse, one of which, entitled “Signs of Rain,” beginning— “The hollow winds begin to blow,” will probably long prove of interest in children’s collections of verse. Some of his epigrams are very apt, as this on the death of a miser— “Tom at last has laid by his old niggardly forms, And now gives good dinners; to whom, pray? the worms.” Singing and violin and flute playing were favourite amusements of his; and in his later years he would lay aside all cares for a time and sing one of his own ballads with all the mirth and gaiety of his youthful days. Science and social intercourse were combined in two societies of which Jenner was the soul—one he called the Medico-convivial, which met usually at Radborough, the other the Convivio-medical, assembling at Alveston. At the meetings of these societies Jenner would often bring forward the reported prophylactic virtues of cowpox, and earnestly recommend his medical friends to inquire into the matter. All his efforts, however, failed to induce them to take it up; and the subject became so distasteful to them that they at one time threatened to expel him if he continued to harass them with so unprofitable a subject.