Ambroise ParÉ, the father of French surgery, and one of the most useful as well as the earliest of the innovators upon that art as practised by the ancients, was born at Laval, in the district of Maine, in the year 1509. After going through the rudiments of education, he was placed at an early age under the tuition of the chaplain Orsoy, in his native town, to be instructed in the classics; but the means of his family appear to have been very narrow, or the economy with which they were supplied must have been strict; for we find that the worthy chaplain was obliged to make use of the services of his pupil in grooming his mule and other menial capacities, in order to eke out the scanty remuneration he received for his instructions. In truth, these do not appear to have been great; for ParÉ never achieved a knowledge of Greek, and was but superficially acquainted with the Latin language; and it is probable that even this small amount of classical acquirement was made at a late period of his life, when, being an author, he wished to quote.

On leaving his tutor, he was placed with a barber-surgeon at Laval, named Vialot, who is recorded to have taught him how to bleed. Not long after this change in his pursuits, the lithotomist, Laurent Colot, came to Laval to undertake the treatment of one of the chaplain’s ecclesiastical brethren: on this occasion, ParÉ was present, and zealously assisted at the operation. This accidental circumstance appears to have suggested to him the ambitious project of following the higher departments of surgery; and he contrived to leave the shop of his master in phlebotomy, and repaired to Paris, where he availed himself with so much diligence of the advantages afforded by that city, as a school of anatomy and medicine, that he was soon entrusted with the subordinate charge of the patients of Goupil, who then held the surgical chair in the college of France. From this discerning tutor he learned not only all the knowledge which could at that time be obtained from secondary sources, but the art of expressing himself well, and acquitting himself of his duties with neatness and grace. The talents thus acquired were of the greatest service to him in his after-life, which was chiefly passed among the great; and gave him that ease of manner and power of gaining confidence, which stood him so frequently in stead as court-surgeon to four successive monarchs, and, aiding the natural frankness of his character, carried him safely through many an intrigue and cabal, dangerous not only to his reputation and fortunes, but even to his life. He was never a member of the community of barber-surgeons, but derived his legal qualification to practise from a degree in surgery taken at the college of St. Edme, of which he was afterwards Provost.

Having passed upwards of three years as a student, residing actually within the walls of the Hotel Dieu at Paris, he was appointed Staff-surgeon, in 1536, when twenty-seven years old, to the Mareschal RenÉ de Monte-jean, who commanded the infantry under the Constable Montmorenci in the campaign of Piedmont. In this capacity, ParÉ was present at the siege and capture of Turin.

From this time is to be dated the commencement of his acquaintance with military surgery, for which he afterwards did so much. “I was then,” he says, “very raw and inexperienced, having never seen the treatment of gunshot wounds. It is true that I had read in the Treatise of Jean de Vigo on wounds in general, that those inflicted by fire-arms partake of a poisonous nature on account of the powder, and that they should be treated with hot oil of elder mixed with a little theriacum. Seeing, therefore, that such an application must needs put the patient to extreme pain, to assure myself before I should make use of this boiling oil, I desired to see how it was employed by the other surgeons. I found their method was to apply it, at the first dressing, as hot as possible, within the wound with tents and setons: and this I made bold to do likewise. At length my oil failed me, and I was fain to substitute a digestive, made of the yolks of eggs, rose-oil, and turpentine. At night I could not rest in my bed in peace, fearing that I should find the wounded, in whose cases I had been compelled to abstain from using this cautery, dead of poison: this apprehension made me rise very early in the morning to visit them; but beyond all my hopes, I found those to whom I had applied the digestive suffering little pain, and their wounds free from inflammation; and they had been refreshed by sleep in the night. On the contrary, I found those to whom the aforesaid oil had been applied, feverish, in great pain, and with swelling and inflammation round their wounds. I resolved, therefore, that I would never burn unfortunate sufferers from gunshot in that cruel manner again.”

Such was the casual origin of one of ParÉ’s greatest improvements in surgery,—the substitution of a mild treatment for the cautery in gunshot wounds; a principle which he afterwards successfully extended to other injuries at that time deemed poisonous. The improvement seems as obvious as it was important: yet the adherents of the old practice gave him much trouble, and even made it necessary for him to defend his wholesome innovation long afterwards before Charles IX. in person.

Yet with all his sound sense, Ambroise ParÉ was not by any means free from the credulity of his age. For instance, he relates, in his account of this siege, an amusing story of the court he paid to an Italian quack doctor, who lived at Turin, to wheedle him out of the secret of a dressing for fresh gunshot wounds, for which he had great fame. This was found to consist of a mixture of bruised worms, the grease of puppies boiled down alive, and other absurd ingredients, constituting the celebrated oleum catellorum, the only merit of which consists in its harmlessness. He is erroneously praised by Dr. Ballingall for having banished this unguent from practice, whereas, on the contrary, he introduced it; and he shows, by his frequent reference to it in his works, that he had no small faith in its virtues, and was exceedingly proud of having been the means of its publication.

The death of his patron, the Mareschal, soon after the fall of Turin, induced him to return to Paris, though tempted by large offers to remain in the camp.

In 1543, he accompanied the Duc de Rohan into Britanny, where Francis I. commanded in person against the English; and the next year he followed that monarch in his expedition to throw supplies into Landrecy. In 1545, he was with the camp at Boulogne, where he cured the general of the royal army, Francis Duke of Guise, of a very dangerous wound, which gained him great reputation.

In 1552, he attended the Duc de Rohan in his campaign in Germany. During this expedition occurred one of those instances of combined humanity and skill, which made ParÉ the favourite of the French army. He thus tells the story: “A party had gone out to attack a church, where the peasants of the country had fortified themselves, hoping to get some provisions, but they came back very soundly beaten; and one especially, a captain-lieutenant of the company of the Duke, returned with seven gashes in his head, the least of which had penetrated to the inner table of the skull, besides four sabre wounds in the arm, and one across the shoulder, which divided the shoulder-blade in half. When he was brought to quarters, the Duke judged him to be so desperately wounded, that he absolutely proposed, as they were to march by daylight, to dig a trench for him, and throw him into it, saying, that it was as well that the peasants should finish him. But being moved with pity, I told him (says ParÉ), that the captain might yet be cured: many gentlemen of the company joined with me in begging that he might be allowed to go with the baggage, since I was willing to dress and cure him. This was accordingly granted: I dressed him, and put him into a small well-covered bed in a cart drawn by one horse. I was at once physician, surgeon, apothecary, and cook to him; and, thank God, I did cure him in the end, to the admiration of all the troops: and out of their first booty, the men-at-arms gave me a crown a-piece, and the archers half-a-crown each.”

His reputation was now so high, that no expedition of importance, especially if generalled by a prince of the blood, or one of the higher nobility, was considered complete without his presence. This was accordingly solicited by the old King of Navarre, more commonly called the Duc de VendÔme, on an occasion of that kind. But being tired of a military life, and disgusted with its cruelties and horrors, he endeavoured to evade the proposal, alleging the illness of his wife, and other excuses: but the Duke would take no denial; and at last he consented to accompany him to the siege of Chateau le Comte. There he acquitted himself so well, that upon the warm encomiums of the Duke he was received into the service of Henry the Second, in 1552, being then but thirty-three years old. From this time he lived at the court, where, with other advantages, obtained not less by his behaviour and wit than his skill, he enjoyed, though a Huguenot, the especial favour of the Queen, Catherine de’ Medici, who was fond of conversing with him in her own language, with which ParÉ had become well acquainted in his Italian campaign. She served him powerfully on several important occasions.

ParÉ, however, still continued to frequent the camp, when any emergency seemed to demand his services. Such an occasion occurred at the renowned siege of Metz, in the winter of 1552, conducted by Charles V. in person, with the Duke of Alva and 120,000 men, against a garrison of 6000, which ended, after two months, in the disastrous retreat of the besiegers. The defence was most gallantly carried on by the flower of the French army, headed by many of the higher noblesse, and several of the princes of the blood, under the Duke of Guise. It has been already mentioned that gunshot wounds were at that time thought to have something poisonous about them; and the severe cold, and other circumstances of that siege, being such as unusually to depress and harass the garrison, their wounds proved almost uniformly fatal; and the idea arose and gained ground, that Charles had ordered his bullets to be actually poisoned. ParÉ alone was thought able to meet the necessity of the case in such an extremity; and the demand for his assistance became so pressing in the dispirited garrison, that at the instance of the Duke of Guise the King was induced to send him. He was stealthily introduced by the treachery of one of Charles’s captains, for a bribe of 1500 crowns, and his appearance on the ramparts was hailed by the troops with the most extravagant expressions of joy. “Now that ParÉ is with us,” they cried, “we shall not perish of our wounds.” Their spirits revived, and the successful issue of their arduous struggle is generally ascribed to the presence of ParÉ.

Upon the raising of the siege, of which, as is usual in his writings, he gives a most lively and humorous account, ParÉ returned to court. In 1553 he was sent on a like errand to the siege of Hesdin, which, after a vigorous defence, and against the faith of a capitulation, was pillaged by the troops of the Duke of Savoy. ParÉ was himself one of the prisoners, but escaped in disguise after various adventures, and returned to Paris; notwithstanding the tempting offers of the Duke of Savoy, who had witnessed his skill, though kept in ignorance of his name.

He was sent upon many other missions of the same kind; as to the fields of St. Quentin and Moncontour; to Rouen, where he attended the Duc de VendÔme on occasion of the wound of which he died; and to St. Denys, where he performed the same unwelcome duty for the Constable. The long intervals of these services he always passed at court, in the enjoyment of his well-earned reputation and favour.

On the death of Henry II. in 1559, occasioned by an accident at a tournament, Francis II., his eldest son by Catherine de’ Medici, succeeded to the crown. He immediately confirmed ParÉ in his situation of surgeon in ordinary and counsellor. It will not be supposed that he could enjoy this constant favour and good fortune without the usual drawback in the excited jealousy of his professional rivals. Their rancour was at length carried to such a pitch, that they gravely accused him of causing the premature death of Francis in 1560, by injecting poison into his ear under the pretext of treating him for an inflammation seated there, of which he died. Catherine, however, shielded him from this attack, expressing her complete reliance on his integrity as well as his skill, in words which the historians of the period have preserved. A similar accusation was brought against him as unsuccessfully in the case of Henry III., who was afflicted with the same disorder: on which occasion the Queen-Mother again stood forward in his behalf, and his innocence was fully attested by the physicians whom she had placed about her son, and who had witnessed every application he made.

On the death of Francis II. in 1560, ParÉ maintained his place in the household of Charles IX., to whom it was thought he had rendered essential service after an injury inflicted on one of the nerves of the arm by an unlucky phlebotomist. This misfortune of his humbler brother was of great use to ParÉ, who, though a courtier during the predominance of the Guises, openly professed the Protestant faith; for it was probably the means of procuring him in Charles the only protector powerful enough to save him from being included in the general massacre of the Huguenots on St. Bartholomew’s Day. BrantÔme and Sully each connect his name with that event. The words of the former are as follows: “Le Roi quand il fÛt jour, ayant mis la tÊte a la fenÊtre de sa chambre, et qu’il voyait aucuns dans le fauxbourg St. Germain qui se remuoient, et se sauvoient, il prit une grande arquebuse de chasse qu’il avoit, et en tira tout plein de coups À eux; mais en vain, car l’arquebuse ne tiroit si loin; incessamment crioit, ‘Tuez, tuez,’ en n’en vouloit sauver aucun si non MaÎtre Ambroise ParÉ, son premier chirurgien, et le premier de la ChrestientÉ, et l’envoya querir et venir le soir dans sa chambre et garde robbe, commandant de n’en bouger; et disoit qu’il n’etoit raisonnable qu’un qui pouvoit servir À tout un petit monde, fÛst ainsi massacrÉ.”

“De tous ceux,” says Sully, “qui approchoient ce prince (Charles IX.) il n’y avoit personne qui eut tant de part À sa confiance qu’ Ambroise ParÉ. Cet homme qui n’etoit que son chirurgien, avoit pris avec lui une si grande familiaritÉ, quoiqu’il fÛt Huguenot, que ce prince lui ayant dit le jour du massacre que c’etoit À cette heure qu’il falloit que tout le monde se fÎt catholique, ParÉ lui rÉpondit sans s’Étonner, ‘Par la lumiÈre de Dieu, Sire, je crois qu’il vous souvient m’avoir promis de ne me commander jamais quatre choses; sÇavoir, de rentre dans le ventre de ma mÈre, de me trouver À un jour de bataille, de quitter votre service, et d’aller À la messe.’”

ParÉ still retained his situation after the accession of Henry III. in 1574; but he seems to have resigned the cares of active life about that time, and we hear little more of him. He died December 2, 1590, in the eighty-first year of his life, and was buried in the church of St. AndrÉ des Arcs in Paris.

ParÉ appears to have been a man of quick and independent observation rather than of reflection or genius. His constitution was vigorous, and fitted no less for social enjoyments than active business: his person was manly and graceful, his spirits buoyant, and his disposition remarkably amiable and attractive; hence he was a universal favourite, particularly in a despotic court, of which the dullness was agreeably relieved by his frankness, and his powers of humour and repartee. The amusing and well-told anecdotes and lively descriptions that teem in all his writings, which, it may be observed, are equal in point of style to any of the time, sufficiently attest his possession of those qualities, even if the stories and bon-mots that are related of him be questioned. His ‘Apology,’ as he calls one of his later pieces, containing an account of his various campaigns and journeys, is full of humour, and well worth the perusal of the general reader. It was published by way of answer to an attack upon his treatment of contused wounds and hÆmorrhages, made by an obscure Parisian lecturer, whose name he does not mention; and he diverts himself exceedingly at the expense of the critic, for his presumption in pretending to teach a surgeon whose experience had been gathered from twenty sieges and fields of battle, through an active professional life of forty years. The raillery he employs is often very keen and pointed, but never ill-natured, and indicates the infinite superiority he felt, and had a right to feel, over his merely book-learned adversary.

His conduct throughout life appears to have been remarkably upright and sincere, though tinctured by the adulation which, in that age of violence and despotism, was always exacted by the great from those who were more humbly born.

He was a bold and good operator, and his general skill and success in the practice of his profession is unquestionable; in that day it must have been wonderful. As a surgical writer, his fame principally rests upon his introduction of a soothing method of treating gunshot and other contused wounds, and his discovery or rather restoration of the method of arresting hÆmorrhage, by the ligature of the bleeding vessel, instead of searing with hot iron, and other insufficient and painful means. But he made many other novel and useful remarks which only do not deserve the name of discoveries, because they relate to more trivial points, and do not involve important principles: and, upon the whole, much as surgery has been improved since his time, there have been few writers to whom it has owed so much as to him, especially in the military department. The whole body of his writings on that subject, though diffuse, merit the perusal of professional men. The same praise cannot be given without exception and reserve to those of his writings which were less the records of his personal experience, than compilations from other sources. His remarks upon the subjects of Physiology, Medical Diseases, the Composition of Remedies, Natural History, and Obstetrics, are not free from error, credulity, and even indelicacy. The latter charge was successfully urged against him by the contemporary Parisian physicians, who were jealous of his encroachments upon what they considered their own domain, and he was obliged to alter the original editions.

He was too much occupied by his practice to engage deeply in the study of anatomy: hence his knowledge of it was rather sufficient than accurate; and though he wrote upon it at some length, and even added new facts to that science, his success in advancing it can only be considered as a proof of the imperfect information of the time. He lived before the discovery of the circulation of the blood.

His first publication, on Gunshot Wounds, in 1545, was incorporated with his other writings, comprising altogether twenty-six treatises, and printed at Paris in one large folio volume in 1561. This, with some posthumous additions, has been often reprinted, and there are translations of it in Latin and other languages. The first English edition was by Thomas Johnson in 1634.