There is no doubt that when about seventeen John went to Glasgow on a visit to his sister, Mrs. Buchanan, whose husband, a cabinet-maker, was failing to get on in business, owing to his musical and social qualities. How far John took part in the business is not recorded, but it is likely that he owed much of his mechanical skill to what he learnt at the shop, which seemed to stick to him much more closely than any book-learning. Finding his efforts to relieve his sister from her difficulties ineffectual, he returned home to Long Calderwood. Mrs. Buchanan died in 1749. We have extremely little knowledge of the workings of John Hunter’s mind in his youth, or how far he was conscious of the great talents that were awaiting the appropriate incentive. His being much given to country amusements is all that we know. At length he tired of having no profession, and his brother William’s success attracted him to London. He begged that he might pay a visit to him, and be his assistant in anatomy, if possible. The request being acceded to, John arrived in London in September 1748, was at once set to work upon a dissection of the muscles of the arm to illustrate his brother’s lectures, and succeeded beyond expectation. He was now established in his brother’s dissecting-room in the winter, and in the summer attended Chelsea Hospital under Cheselden. It was evident that John had found an occupation suited to his capabilities, and in his second season he was placed in full charge of the pupils in the dissecting-room, while Dr. Hunter almost confined himself to his lectures. In 1751 John became a pupil at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, where Percival Pott was then a leading surgeon. In 1754 he was entered as a surgeon’s pupil at St. George’s Hospital, where a chance of a surgeoncy was more likely than at St. Bartholomew’s. In 1756 he was for some months house-surgeon at St. George’s. Between these two last dates he became temporarily resident at Oxford, where his name was put down at St. Mary’s Hall, June 5, 1755. Probably the idea was that he should become a physician, taking an Oxford degree in medicine; but he was in no humour “to stuff Latin and Greek at the University;” and he never conquered his aversion to classics. Long afterwards he wrote: “Jesse Foot[12] accuses me of not understanding the dead languages; but I could teach him that on the dead body which he never knew in any language dead or living.” The last entry of charges for battels against John’s name in the buttery-book of St. Mary’s Hall occurs on July 25, 1755, so that he probably resided less than two months. His name was kept on the books, however, till December 10, 1756.