Although von Haller, upon the death of his father, had been left with very slender financial means, he managed, under the guidance of Albinus, on leaving Tübingen in 1725, to visit Leyden, in Holland, where he was able to prosecute his anatomical researches and at the same time to follow the instruction of Boerhaave, who was still at that period in full possession of his powers as a teacher. Extraordinary as it will appear to the physicians of to-day, von Haller, when only nineteen years old, passed successfully the required examinations at Leyden and was given the degree of Doctor of Medicine (1727). From Holland von Haller went first to London, where he accepted the invitation of James Douglas, the anatomist, to assist him in his studies of the structure of the bones. Then from there he next visited Paris (1728), where he had for his teachers Le Dran, the distinguished French surgeon, and Winslow, the well-known anatomist. It was his original intention to make a prolonged stay in the French metropolis, but, unfortunately, his ambition to get ahead as fast as possible in the study of anatomy led him to disregard certain precautions which, in the early part of the eighteenth century, it was not at all safe for men interested in this branch of medical science to neglect. Recognizing the fact that, in order to advance his knowledge of anatomy, he must have a certain amount of human dissecting material at his command, and finding that he could procure this material in no other way than by the process commonly known as “body-snatching,” he decided, in association with one of the prosectors of the medical school, to adopt that method of procuring the material needed. The plan was successfully carried out, the disinterred body was transferred to von Haller’s apartment, and the two enthusiastic anatomists had already done a certain amount of dissecting when an unexpected obstacle was encountered. The layman who occupied the adjoining room overheard enough of the conversation that was being carried on between von Haller and his friend to suspect strongly the true nature of the work in which they were engaged. But, to make sure that his surmise was correct, he bored a peek-hole through the partition wall, and thus was able to remove from his mind all doubt about the nature of this work. The police were promptly notified, and von Haller was summoned to appear before the authorities to answer the charge of having disobeyed the law relating to dissections of the human body. Not being able to furnish a satisfactory reply to this charge, and wishing to escape from the severe penalties that would certainly have been inflicted upon him had he been apprehended, von Haller went at once into hiding in Paris and eventually succeeded in making his way over the border into Switzerland. [Illustration: LAUSANNÆ, Vignette from the title-page of Haller’s “_Elementa Physiologiæ_,” Lausanne, 1757 ]