Mr Hunter, however, died soon
after this; and his promise was not fulfilled by the Board which
succeeded him in the medical direction of the army, and which
appears to have pursued Dr Jackson with uniform hostility.
Returning to England with the troops, it was offered to him to
accompany, in the capacity of chief medical officer, Sir Ralph
Abercromby's expedition against some of the West India islands; and
although no employment could possibly have been more agreeable to
his taste, he, much to Sir Ralph's chagrin, declined the flattering
proposal, on the grounds, that lower terms had been offered to him
than to another professional man. Nothing but a sense of
professional delicacy, it is plain, governed him in this
transaction, for he immediately afterwards embarked (April 1796) as
_second_ medical officer in another expedition to San Domingo.
During his abode in this island, he was unwearied in enlarging his
acquaintance with tropical diseases--observing the rule he had
followed in Holland of noting down by the patient's bedside the
minutest particulars of every case he attended, the effects of the
treatment pursued, and whatever else might shed light on the
intricacies of pathological science. He also gave a larger practical
operation to the scheme he had years before devised of amending the
dietaries of military hospitals.
After the evacuation of San Domingo in 1798, our physician paid a
visit to the United States, where he was received with signal
distinction, his reputation having preceded him.
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