ALBINO. The name Albinism, or Leucopathia, is applied to a remarkable peculiarity in the physical constitution of certain individuals, which consists in the skin and hair being perfectly white. The earliest accounts we have of it refer to its being observed among the negroes of West Africa by the Portuguese, who called the persons so affected Albinοes. They have also been called Leucoethiopes, i. e., white negroes. Albinism is most common and most marked in the negro and Indian races, but it occurs in all parts of the world and among all the varieties of the human race. The appearance arises from the absence of the minute particles of colouring matter which ordinarily occur in the lowest and last-deposited layers of the epidermis or outer skin, and to the presence of which the skin owes its colour. With very rare exceptions, it affects the entire body, and continues through life. The skin of the albino is of a dull milky or pearly colour, unrelieved by the slightest tint of red or brown, and is generally of rough texture. All the hair on the body is of the same dull hue, and is commonly soft and silky. Another peculiarity that invariably accompanies this whiteness of skin and hair is an affection of the eyes: the pupil is a bright red, and the iris (or white of the eye) that surrounds it is of a pale rose colour. This redness is attributable to the absence of a colouring matter, the pigmentum nigrum of the membrane of the eye, which serves to protect the retina. In consequence of this defect, the eye of an albino cannot bear a strong light. Albinism is hereditary in the same limited degree as blindness, deafness, &c. See on this Darwin’s Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication (chap. xii.), where mention is made that “two brothers married two sisters, ...

ALBINUS (originally Weiss), Bernard Siegfried, a celebrated anatomist, born in 1697 at Frankfort-on-the-Oder, where his father was professor of the practice of medicine. In 1702 the latter was transferred to a professorship at Leyden, and it was there that Bernard Siegfried commenced his studies, having for his teachers such men as Boërhaave, Bidloo, and Rau. His great ability, especially in surgery and anatomy, was early recognised, and Rau, so justly celebrated as a lithotomist, is said to have seldom performed an important operation without inviting him to be present. Having finished his studies at Leyden, he went to Paris, where, under the instruction of Vaillant, Winslow, and others, he devoted himself especially to anatomy and botany. After a year’s absence, he was, on the recommendation of Boerhaave, recalled in 1719 to Leyden to be a lecturer on anatomy and surgery. Two years later he succeeded his father in the professorship of these subjects, and delivered an address at his installation which was received with universal approbation. Albinus speedily became one of the most famous teachers of anatomy in Europe, his classroom being resorted to not only by students, but by many practising physicians. With little original genius, and no special talent for exposition, he possessed those habits of accurate observation and patient research which are the best qualification for his department of study. The engravings of bones and muscles executed by Wandelaar for the treatise of Albinus on these organs were far superior in clearness and exactness to anything that had previously been produced. In 1745 Albinus was appointed professor of the practice of medicine, being succeeded in the anatomical chair by his brother Frederick Bernard, who, as well as another brother, ...