Sir James Paget

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Abstract
James Paget1,2 was born in 1814, one of seventeen children. He studied at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where he made his first original observation. Small, hard specks were often seen at that time in muscle and he became very curious as to their nature. Since St. Bartholomew's did not have a microscope, he traveled to the British Museum, and discoveredTrichinella spiralis. In 1842, he began to assist in the cataloguing of the College of Surgeons' Museum. In the next year, he was given the lectureship in physiology at St. Bartholomew's, and was appointed Warden of the new residential college for medical students of that hospital. His lectures attracted increasing numbers of students, and ultimately he was made assistant surgeon. The professorship of anatomy and surgery of the College of Surgeons came next. The course of lectures Paget delivered was on general pathology. In 1849, the Pathological Catalogue of the College of Surgeons' Museum was completed and formed an exact description of over 3,500 specimens of which he was the greatest contributor. Paget established himself as one of the most notable pathologists of all time, with thirty learned bodies conferring distinction upon him. It is interesting to note that the first description of Paget's disease of the anus wasnot by Sir James Paget. He described only the breast condition. Darier and Couillaud are here presented as the original describers of Paget's disease of the anus. There might be some confusion with respect to their statement that their report was the second case published of this condition. They refer to Crocker, who described Paget's disease of the scrotum and penis, not of the perianal area. Some question existed at that time as to whether indeed pagetoid cells were present in Crocker's specimen. However, nowhere in his article does he descrie the disease involving the anal area. The original Paget article3 is included in its entirety. The translation of the Darier and Couillaud article4 (written in French) has been abridged somewhat as it seemed rather verbose.

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