In time, however, this folly was given up, and by the latter half of the sixteenth century public anatomical theatres were established. The most celebrated was built by Fabricus ab Aquapendente, in Padua. It was so high, however, and so dark that dissections even in broad daylight could only be made visible by torchlight. The zeal with which gradually the better class of physicians pursued their scientific studies became more and more conspicuous, evidenced in many ways by the hardships with which some of them had to deal, as witness the struggles of many of the great anatomists of those days. And so in time the clergy disappeared almost entirely from the ranks of public physicians, and after the Thirty Years' War completely lost their supremacy even in literary matters, this being gradually usurped by the nobility and the more educated laymen; but even then knowledge was pursued under difficulties, especially the study of anatomy. It was not until 1658 that a mounted skeleton could be found in Vienna. Strasburg obtained one in 1671. The handling of the dead body, which we regard as so necessary, was in those days avoided as much as possible. The professor of anatomy rarely, if ever, touched it himself, but he lectured or read a lecture while the actual dissection was done with a razor by a barber, under his supervision. Practical instruction in obstetrics, which would seem almost as important as that in anatomy, was not given in those days; male students only studied it theoretically. In the Hôtel Dieu, in Paris, that part which was devoted to instruction in midwifery was closed against men. It was the midwives in those days who enjoyed the monopoly of this teaching, and upon whom the greatest dependence for obstetrical ability was placed. The physicians proper, or _medici puri_ of the seventeenth century, were individuals of greatest dignity and profoundest gravity, who wore fur-trimmed robes, perukes, and carried swords, who considered it beneath them to do anything more than write prescriptions in the old Galenic fashion. Some continuation of this is seen in the distinction made even to-day in England between the physicians who enjoy the title of doctor and the surgeons who affect to disdain it. These old physicians knowing nothing of surgery, nevertheless demanded to be always consulted in surgical cases, claiming that only by this course could things go right. Still when elements of danger were introduced, as in treating the plague, they were glad enough to send the barber surgeons into the presence of the sick, whom they merely inspected through panes of glass. Very entertaining pictures could be furnished you illustrating the habits of the physicians of two or three hundred years ago in dealing with these contagious cases. The masks and armor which they wore and the precautions which they took would seem to indicate protection rather against the weapons of mediæval warfare. At one time they were advised