support and personal exertion. Lancasterian schools were rapidly established in all parts of the kingdom.
Dr Bell lived long enough to witness the introduction of his system into 12,973 national schools, educating 900,000 of the children of his English countrymen, and to know that it was employed extensively in almost every other civilized country. He acquired in later life the dignity of a prebendary of Westminster, and was master of Sherborn hospital, Durham. He was also a member of the Asiatic Society, and of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He employed himself during his latter years in writing several works on education, among which the most valuable were, "The Elements of Tuition," "The English School," and a "Brief Manual of Mutual Instruction and Discipline." The evening of his pious and useful life was spent at Cheltenham, in the practice of every social and domestic virtue. Previously to his death he bestowed 120,000, three per cent, stock, for the purpose of founding an academy on an extensive and liberal scale in his native city. He also bequeathed a considerable sum for purposes of education in Edinburgh; which, however, to the everlasting disgrace of the individuals intrusted with the public affairs of that city at the time, was compromised among the general funds of that corporation, a few months before its bankruptcy.
Dr Bell died on the 27th of January, 1832, in the eightieth year of his age, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, the archbishop of Canterbury and the bishop of London acting as chief mourners.
BELL, Benjamin, a distinguished surgical author, was born in Dumfries in 1749. He received an excellent classical education at the grammar-school of that town, under Dr Chapman, the rector. The property of Blackett House, in Dumfriesshire, having devolved to him on the death of his grandfather, he gave a remarkable instance of generosity by disposing of it, and applying the proceeds in educating himself and the younger branches of the family, fourteen in number.
Mr Bell had early made choice of medicine as a profession, and accordingly he was bound apprentice to Mr Hill, surgeon in Dumfries, whose practice was in that quarter very extensive. It was a distinguishing feature in Mr Bell's character, that whatever he had once engaged in was prosecuted with extreme ardour and assiduity. He therefore went through the drudgery and fatigue necessarily connected with the detail of a surgeon apothecary's shop, with the greatest spirit. He, by degrees, materially assisted his master, by attending his patients; to whom his correct behaviour, unfailing good humour, and agreeable manners recommended him in the most powerful manner. He repaired to Edinburgh in 1766, entered himself as a member of the university, and set himself, with the most serious application, to the prosecution of his medical studies. The Edinburgh medical school had just sprung into notice, and was beginning to make very rapid strides to its present eminence. The first and second Monro had already given evident tokens of the most distinguished genius. The first had now relinquished, in favour of his equally skilful son, the business of the anatomical theatre, and only occasionally delivered clinical lectures in the infirmary. Mr Bell's ardour in the study of anatomy, in all its branches, was unabated. As he proposed to practise surgery, he was well aware that eminence in that department of the profession could only be arrived at by persevering industry. He was appointed house-surgeon to the royal infirmary, which afforded him every opportunity of improvement. It was here that he laid the foundation of that superior adroitness and dexterity which so peculiarly characterized him in the many hazardous but successful operations which he was called to perform.
Though Mr Bell was more particularly designed for the profession of a surgeon, there was no department of medicine neglected by him. Dr Black, whose discoveries formed a new era in the science of chemistry, bad been removed from
