A still more important work, as regarded costliness, was the formation of the museum, which still remains for the benefit of students as the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow University. Economical from the first, as regarded his personal expenses, William Hunter, after laying aside a sufficient sum to provide for old age or sickness, applied his thoughts to the foundation of an anatomical school in London. During Mr. Grenville’s administration, in 1765, he petitioned him for the grant of a piece of ground on which to build an anatomical theatre, undertaking to spend £7000 on the building, and to endow a permanent professorship of anatomy. It can hardly be believed that such a munificent offer was rejected; but it was the middle of the eighteenth century, and the government pension to Dr. Johnson was probably considered the utmost stretch of public countenance to learning and science. Lord Shelburne, it is true, expressed a wish that Dr. Hunter’s proposal might be carried out by means of a general subscription, and offered himself to contribute a thousand guineas. But William Hunter was not the man to depend for the execution of his projects upon an appeal of this kind, and he consequently purchased a plot of ground in Great Windmill Street, near the Haymarket, where he built a suitable house for his own residence, with a lecture-theatre, dissecting-rooms, and a handsome room for a museum. To this he removed in 1770 from Jermyn Street. He had already a very large collection of human, comparative, and morbid anatomy, which he continued to augment. He purchased all the best collections of morbid and other anatomical specimens that were offered for sale, such as those of Sandys, Falconer (which included Hewson’s), and Blackall. To these were added numerous specimens of rare diseases, presented to him by medical friends and pupils. We discern the light in which he viewed these gifts by the following statement in one of his publications: “I look upon everything of this kind which is given to me as a present to the public, and consider myself as thereby called upon to serve the public with more diligence.” And the museum was always open to the many visitors who were attracted by its fame. Dr. Hunter’s tastes expanded. He collected fossils, rare books, and coins. Dr. Harwood described his library as including the most magnificent treasure of Greek and Latin books that had been accumulated by any person then living. The anatomist even discovered a bibliographical novelty in comparing two copies of the Aldine edition of Theocritus, which he found to present material differences, though representing the same edition. The collection of coins in this museum was of such value and importance that an illustrated quarto was devoted to the description of a portion of them by William Combe. The preface gives an account of the progress of the collection, which had now cost no less than twenty thousand pounds.