descriptions of them never become obsolete or useless. Baillie shows remarkable acuteness in perceiving the uncertainty of the pathology of his time. He restricts himself to precise descriptions of what he had seen, and little is to be found in his pages which is not of permanent value. He was the first to define exactly the condition of the liver now known as cirrhosis, and to distinguish the common renal cysts from the rare cysts of parasitic hydatids of the kidney. He demolished the prevalent opinion, that death was often due to a growth in the heart, and showed that the polypus, as it was called, was in reality a mass of coagulated fibrin formed after death. He described simple ulcer of the stomach and the ulcers of typhoid fever, though the full meaning of these appearances was not made out till some years after his death. The book was dedicated to his friend. Dr. David Pitcairn, whose fatal illness and autopsy a few years later gave Baillie the opportunity of describing a morbid condition before unknown. Two additions were afterwards made to the book. In 1797 a few notes were added on the anatomy found in relation to particular symptoms, and in 1799 a fine series of engravings by Mr. Clift. Baillie's practice soon began to increase, and in 1799 was so great that he resigned his post of physician at St. George's Hospital and gave up lecturing. He went to live in Grosvenor Street, and became physican extraordinary to George III. From this time forth his labours were only useful to his own generation. He was not of a robust constitution, and his health was ruined by a practice beyond his strength. For several years he saw patients or wrote letters for sixteen hours a day, and after a few years he ceased to enjoy an annual holiday. In consultation he was famed, for the clearness with which he expressed his opinion in simple terms. He despised every way of obtaining professional eminence except that of superior knowledge, and while he treated the opinions of others with consideration was firm in his own. There are many proofs of his kindness to patients, but he sometimes gave sharp replies to foolish questions when suffering from the irritation of overwork.
He married Sophia, daughter of Dr. Denman and sister of the law lord, and he left two children. During the period of his great practice Baillie made a few contributions to clinical medicine. These, and some others which he left unpublished, are to be found in the collected edition of his works ('The Works of Matthew Baillie, M.D.,' to which is prefixed an Account of his Life by James Wardrop, 2 vols., London, 1825). They are not of the same value as his morbid anatomy, for he had no time to think out the general results of his bedside observations. In a short essay on 'Pulsation of the Aorta in the Epigastrium,' he was the first to show that this symptom is often present without any internal structural change.
Baillie died of phthisis on 23 Sept. 1823. He bequeathed his collection of specimens of morbid anatomy, of books and of drawings, to the College of Physicians with a sum of money. The gold-headed cane which Baillie had received from Dr. David Pitcairn, to whom it had descended through William Pitcairn, Askew, and Mead from Radclifte (The Gold-headed Cane, London, 1827, and new edition by Dr. Munk, 1884), was presented by Baillie's widow to the College of Physicians, and is there preserved, with the arms of its successive possessors engraved upon it. Baillie died at his country house, and was buried in the parish church of Duntisbourne, Gloucestershire, and he is commemorated in Westminster Abbey by a bust and inscription,
[Collected Works; Lectures and Observations on Medicine by the late Matthew Baillie, M.D., privately printed, 1825.]
BAILLIE, ROBERT, D.D. (1599–1662), one of the most learned of the earlier Scottish presbyterian divines, was born at Glasgow in 1599 (Letters and Journals, ed. Laing, 1841-2, 3 vols.) His father is described as son of Baillie of Jerviston (Jerviswood?), and descended of the Baillies of Hoprig and Lamington—Lamington coming to them through a marriage with the daughter of Sir William Wallace. But although of high descent, Robert Baillie's father was a citizen of Glasgow and engaged there in trade. Robert Baillie entered the university of his native city as a mere lad. He took its highest degree of M.A. Having further studied theology, he, 'about the year' 1622, received orders, not from the church of Scotland—i.e. presbyterians—but from Archbishop Law of Glasgow. He was chosen also a regent of philosophy in his university. Whilst in this ofiice he was tutor to a son of the Earl of Eglinton. In spite of his episcopal ordination, that earl presented him to the parish of Kilwinning, Ayrshire—i.e. of the church of Scotland. Notwithstanding that he was now a clergyman of the national church of Scotland, he kept up an affectionate correspondence with the archbishop. In 1629 he delivered an oration 'In laudem Linguae Hebreae.' In 1633 he declined a translation to Edinburgh. In 1637 his patron the archbishop requested him to preach a sermon in
