XIII STATE AND THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 333 



years ago, and I cannot see what excuse there 

 would be for meddling with them if it were not 

 for two other defects which have to be reme- 

 died. 



Unfortunately there remain two or three black 

 sheep — licensing bodies which simply trade upon 

 their privilege, and sell the cheapest wares they 

 can for shame's sake supply to the bidder. An- 

 other defect in the existing system, even where 

 the examination has been so greatly improved as 

 to be good of its kind, is that there are certain 

 licensing bodies which give a qualification for an 

 acquaintance with either medicine or surgery 

 alone, and which more or less ignore obstetrics. 

 This is a revival of the archaic condition of the 

 profession when surgical operations were mostly 

 left to the barbers and obstetrics to the mid- 

 wives, and when the physicians thought them- 

 selves, and were considered by the world, the 

 " superior persons " of the profession. I remem- 

 ber a story was current in my young days of a 

 great court physician who was travelling with a 

 friend, like himself, bound on a visit to a country 

 house. The friend fell down in an apoplectic fit, 

 and the physician refused to bleed him because 

 it was contrary to professional etiquette for a 

 physician to perform that operation. Whether 

 the friend died or whether he got better because 

 he was not bled I do not remember, but the moral 

 of the storv is the same. On the other hand, a 



