Worse than ten Munroes

Monro, Alexander (1733 — 1817)

In 1754 he succeeded his father, also Alexander Monro (1697 — 1767), as professor of anatomy and was also the first occupant of the chair of surgery in Edinburgh University (1777). Burns mentioned him in the fragment 'The Poet's Progress'.


"Critics! Appall'd, I venture on the name,
Those cut-throat bandits in the paths of fame:
Bloody dissectors, worse than ten Munroes;
He hacks to teach, they mangle to expose."