126 FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 



diate care and management — goat-herders, shepherds, and the like — and ^\h 

 was known with regard to the actions of medicines, existed among those- 

 possessing the art of human physif^. Indeed we are told that Hippocrates, who 

 flourished about four hundred years before the Christian era, and who has- 

 been appropriately named the " Father of Medicine," did not disdain to prac- 

 tice both upon the horse and his rider (people did not drive in those days).. 

 The eighteenth century, though, was destined to witness the most important 

 epoch in the annals of veterinary history. About this time epizootics were 

 rampant, so much so that the agricultural interest of many countries was 

 materially affected by the destruction of their live stock, and people were- 

 sadly at a loss to know where to turn for counsel, but the French government, 

 ever in the vanguard in such matters, set the notable example of establishing- 

 a school for the purpose of teaching what we commonly call veterinary surgery. 

 (Let me here say that the term veterinary is derived from a Latin adjective, 

 yeterinarius, "that which appertains to the beast of burden," but is now 

 intended, of course, to include all domestic or farm animals.) This school, or 

 college, was instituted at Lyons in 1781, and to-day is looked upon as one of 

 the leading schools of the time. A few years later a second school 

 was established at Alfort, near Paris, which is now in high repute. In 

 English-speaking countries the science seemed to be buried in gross ignorance- 

 for considerably longer than it was in France, Germany, and other countries, 

 for it was not until the last decade of the eighteenth century that an energetic- 

 Frenchman named St. Bel, after a second attempt, was successful in establish- 

 ing a college in London, and even his efforts the second time would have beea 

 defeated had not hie proposition been noticed by the Agricultural society of 

 Hampshire, whose most enterprising members became convinced of the great- 

 benetit the establishment of such an institution would be to the agriculturist 

 engaged in stock raising, and gave such encouragement to St. Bel's proposition 

 that in 1792 the Veterinary college of London was fairly started. In 1820 the 

 Highland Agricultural society established a similar institution at Edinburgh,. 

 Since then veterinary colleges have been established in almost all civilized 

 countries. The fashion now, on this side of the Atlantic at all events, is to- 

 have them affiliated with a university or agricultural college. Now when men 

 are required to study an art or science in such a way as to be able to pass an 

 examination before outside examiners, as is the case at veterinary colleges, of 

 course it is necessary that they become familiar with the current literature and 

 other matters connected with that art or science; so that, as year after year rolls- 

 on, the profession, through efforts of its members, accumulates an amount of 

 knowledge which would swell a good-sized book shelf. This style of literature 

 contains besides other things, a description of the mahidies peculiar to certain 

 countries, their behavior under certain climatic influences, their effecs upon 

 different animals under different circumstances, as well as other matters ia 

 relation to disease, written by men trained and educated in a systematic 

 manner, which enables them to discuss somewhat intelligently the various- 

 topics which are brought under their notice, and by the accretion and dissemi- 

 nation of this kind of information agricultviral interests are benefited, and 

 protected to some extent from the evil influences of those contagious and other 

 diseases which have been the subject of so much investigation, both by govern- 

 ment experts and private enterprise, and which, with our present system of 

 commerce, would spread far and near were their march not arrested by official ' 

 restriction. In olden times, let me say, these maladies were chiefly spread by 

 contending armies whose marching and counter-marching would gather and 



