LAZEAR
87
LEAMING
which was known to have bitten a
yellow-fever patient to alight upon his
hand and take its fill. Five days later
he was taken ill with the disease, but
before he would consent to be removed
to the yellow-fever hospital he made
over to his colleague, Dr. Carroll his
notes on mosquito inoculation and
told him of his personal experience.
For three days he held his own, but
then the dreaded black vomit made its
appearance, a symptom which he well
knew indicated that the case was all
but hopeless. Dr. Carroll who visited
him at this time said that he could
never forget the expression of alarm
in his eyes when this symptom was
impending. Four days later, on Sep-
tember 26, 1900, he died.
Lazear's early death was a most griev- ous loss to his profession and to the world at large. He laid down his life before the Yellow Fever Commission had well entered upon their work, so early indeed in its career that his name appears on but one of their published reports. Nevertheless, although his un- timely death deprived him of a full share in the brilliant results which they achieved, he did heroic service and Dr. Reed, when speaking of him before the Medical and Chirurgical Society of Maryland, closed his remarks with these words: "It is my earnest wish that, whatever credit may hereafter be given to the work of the American Com- mission in Cuba, the name of my late colleague, Dr. Lazear, may always be associated therewith."
Dr. Lazear is buried at the Loudon Park Cemetery at Baltimore and a memorial tablet has been erected to his memory at the Johns Hopkins Hospital.
He married and left two children, the younger of whom he never saw.
C. W. L.
The Etiology of Yellow Fever, Reed Carroll
and Lazear, Phila., 1900.
J. Am. Med. Ass., Chicago, 1900, vol. xxxv.
Johns Hopkins Hosp. Bull., Bait., 1900, vol.
xi.
Science, N. Y. and Lancaster, Pa., 1900, n. s.,
vol. xii.
Learning, James Rosebrugh (1820-
1892).
On February 20, 1820 there was born at Groveland, Livings County, one James Rosebrugh Leaming, des- tined to help suffering humanity by his special study of chest affections. In 1845 he studied under Dr. Lauderdale of Genesco; in 1847 matriculated at, and in 1849 graduated from^ New York University, immediately after settling down to practise in that city, where his lectures in the New York clinic, of which he was president, were striking- ly clear, original and useful. " Beyond all doubt his greatest teaching was with regard to pleural pathology and the interpleural origin of rales. His teaching of the latter met with a storm of opposition, but he lived to see his propositions meet with wide-spread ac- ceptancy in the profession." By com- mon consent Dr. Leaming was credited with an ear, which in its acuteness, was almost without a rival. He will be always regarded as a leading diag- nostician of heart and lungs. He was so sure of his own power of detecting the occult features of cases that one of his dying regrets was the inability to sound his own chest. Curiously, his acuteness of observation seemed to extend to his quick knowledge of men, so astonishing was the accurate estimate he formed.
He died on December 5, 1902, after suffering heroically, aged seventy- two.
Among his many memberships was that of the New York Academy of Medicine; the Pathological Society; the Medical Society of the State of New York, and the American Medical Association; and among his noteworthy writings are:
"Cardiac Murmurs," New York, 1868; "Respiratory Murmurs," New York, 1872; "Plastic Exudation within the Pleura, Dry Pleurisy, " Philadelphia, 1873; "Contributions to the Study of Diseases of Heart and Lungs," New York, 1884; "Significance of Disturbed
