Henry Hyde Salter (1823-71): a biographical sketch.

Henry Hyde Salter, the author of the best book on asthma to appear during the nineteenth century, was born on 2 November 1823 in Poole, Dorset, the second son of Thomas Salter FRCS, a successful Dorset surgeon. The family was very much a medical onenot only his father but his grandfather, uncle, and three brothers were all doctors. Salter matriculated at the University of London, entered King's College in 1844 and graduated with a first class BA in 1846. Influenced by his father, he decided on a career in medicine, pursued his studies at King's College and qualified in 1850. After junior appointments, including the post of demonstrator in anatomy, he proceeded MD in 1851 and settled at 6 Mongatue Street, Russell Square. In 1852 he was appointed physician to the public dispensary in Carey Street. Salter then transferred his activities to Charing Cross Hospital, where he was appointed assistant physician and lecturer in physiology and pathology in the department of Professor Robert Bentley Todd (1809-60), who occupied the chair of physiology and is today remembered eponymously for "Todd's paralysis." Todd was producing the last two volumes of his Cyclopaedia of Anatomy and Physiology and Salter assisted him in editing these, himself writing two sections, "The Tongue" and "The Pancreas." He also took part in the completion of Physiological Anatomy under the joint authorship of Todd and Sir William Bowman (1816-92). In 1856, at the age of 33, Salter became the youngest fellow elected to the Royal College of Physicians and the youngest elected to the fellowship of the Royal Society. The latter honour was bestowed for his physiological work; he was obviously highly regarded since his sponsors, apart from Todd and Bowman, included Richard Owen, John Simon, Thomas Bell, and Thomas Henry Huxley. Salter had aspirations to succeed Todd in the chair of physiology at Charing Cross but, when this did not happen, he returned in 1854 to his alma mater, King's College, where for the next 12 years he was lecturer in physiology and physiological anatomy and later lecturer in medicine. Despite a slight stammer, he estab-