Bertin, Exuperius Joseph

, an eminent French anatomist, was born at Tremblay in Britanny, Sept. 21, 1712. At the age of three he was left an orphan, yet learned Latin almost without a master, and was sent afterwards to Rennes to complete his education. He then went to Paris, and studied medicine with such success, that, in 1737, he took his doctor’s degree at Rheims, and in 1741 was admitted a regent member of the faculty of Paris. About the end of that year he accepted the place of physician to the prince of Moldavia, but after two years returned to France. The academy of sciences which had in his absence chosen him a corresponding member, now, in 1744, admitted him to the honour of being an associate without the intermediate rank of adjunct. The fatigues, however, which he had encountered in Moldavia, and his assiduous application to anatomical studies, had at this time impaired his health, and, joined to a nervous temperament, threw him into a state of mental debility which interrupted his studies for three years. He was afterwards recommended to travel, and it was not until the year 1750 that he recovered his health and spirits, and was enabled to resume his studies at Gahard, a retired spot near Rennes. There also he employed some part of his time in the education of his children, and his reputation brought him extensive practice. On Feb. 21, 1781, he was seized with a complaint in his breast, which carried him off in four days. Before and after his long illness, he had furnished several valuable papers to the memoirs of the academy of sciences, particularly three on the circulation in the foetus. His principal publications were, 1. “Traite d’Osteologie,” 1754, 4 vols. 12mo, a very popular work at that time, and still deserving of perusal. It was intended as the first part of a general course of anatomy. 2. “Lettre au D sur le nouveau systeme de la Voix,” Hague, 1745, 8vo. This being answered by Ferrein, or his pupil Montagnat, our author, without putting his name to it, defended his doctrine in “Lettres sur le nouveau systeme de la Voix, et sur les arteres lymphatiques,” 1748. 3. “Consultation sur | la legitimite' des naissances tardives,” 1764 and 1765, 8vo. His chief argument here seems to be the simple position that if there are early births, there may also be late births. 4. “Memoire sur les consequences relatives a la pratique, deduites de la structure des os parietaux,” inserted in the Journal de Medicine, 1756. He left in manuscript Memoirs on Moldavia, which his son Rene Joseph, an eminent physician of Paris, intends to publish. ¹