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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



THE PRESENT STATE OF VETERINARY SCIENCE. 



Difficult indeed is the choice of a profession. There 

 is scarcely one but the ranks of which are already over- 

 crowded. Youths qualify themselves as medical men, 

 to become clerks or guards on railways ; while gentle- 

 men learned in the law are waiting at table in Mel- 

 bourne, or horse-breaking in the Bush. Divines and 

 soldiers find it alike difficult to get on ; and too 

 often end as they began — but as curates and subalterns. 

 Even farming, as a business, requires more and more 

 capital to be fairly engaged upon ; and trade of 

 almost every kind is beset with opposition. But a few 

 years since, to be sure, the famous Fitz-Boodle gave 

 to younger sons some further opportuuities, which, j 

 however, appear to have been scarcely appreciated. 

 We are still languishing for some eligible pursuit, 

 wherewith to employ the rising generation. As a 

 relief — a sort of tributary stream to those already over- 

 crowded with traffic and commerce — is there none we 

 can embark upon? Is there nothing beyond Law, 

 Physic, and Divinity ? Or is there no opening to us but 

 what^emigration offers, or the fortune of war provides ? 

 If a lad is yet anxious to work his way in his own 

 country, is there really no other call for his services, or 

 no pursuit that might be turned to a better account than 

 it now is ? 



Let us see. Our canny friends over the Border would 

 at least appear to think so. Very recently there has 

 been established, in Edinburgh, a new Veterinary 

 School, at the opening of which a well-known professor, 

 Mr. John Gamgee, delivered the inaugural address. 

 It is altogether above the level of such orations ; and is 

 especially remarkable for the bold and uiibiassed view 

 Mr. Gamgee takes of his own profession, and the pro- 

 gress it has made. We are generally prone to con- 

 sider this as very satisfactory. The difference between 

 the intelligent educated veterinarian and the village 

 farrier, with his infallible drinks and messes, was 

 at once apparent. Perhaps " the college man " 

 has not always taken that position he miyht 

 have done; but still every one felt he was 

 a change for the better, and we saw him prescribe 

 for a sick horse or prize ox with far more confidence 

 than we could have done had a grimy Vulcan or half- 

 drunken cow-leech yet been concocting his curious 

 spells before us. Nevertheless it would seem that the 

 art is by no means equal to what is demanded of it. 

 " Hundreds of thousands of pounds," says Mr. Gamgee, 

 " are annually lost on British soil, which might be 

 saved if the veterinarian could be ibund wherever he 

 may be in requisition, and if at the same time suitahle 

 truining had rendered him a useful man." Our 

 lecturer strengthens this opinion with a ready applica- 

 tion of what recently has occurred and is still occurring 

 amongst us. Speaking as to the investigation of morbid 

 phenomena in animals, he says : — 



" The last few years fully prove, even with reference to the 

 epizootic diseases of Great Britain, how imperfect is our 

 knowledge respecting them, and how insufficient have been 

 the inquiries. It is impossible that a person, aware of what 

 should be the qualifications of a veteriuarian, can unblushingly 

 read the reports which have spread from various parts of 

 ^e United Kingdom respecting murrain amongst cattle. 

 Those who road the daily newspapers might often be led to 

 ask. Have we lo veterinarians in Great Britain? It is said 

 that a dozen animals have died altogether on one farm and 

 that in some districts the best part of a hundred valuable oxen 

 has been swept off, in a msnner as quick as it has been rayste- 

 nou^, and there is no one at hand to furnish the world with 



anything like a correct account of the real facts of the case. A 

 plague is spreading from the Russian steppes ; it is supposed 

 to have made a leap close to the west coast of Ireland, or in 

 the north of Scotland : we know nothing about the cause of 

 death there; but we must go to Hungary, to learn what might 

 be learnt at home from books written almost centuries ago, 

 though certainly in a foreign tongue." 



This is undoubtedly very hard hitting ; but if it is true, 

 we must all have been something more than apathetic. 

 Mr. Gamgee himself characterises the evil as chiefly 

 attributable to a want of hands. He, in fact, opens a 

 new profession to us. The veterinary art has not for 

 some years had anything like justice done to it. It 

 is not properly nor sufficiently studied, in the 

 first place; while in the next, there is a sad scarcity 

 of practitioners, even qualified as they now are. 

 In England we had certainly thought a veterinarian 

 was by this pretty generally within hail. In 

 Scotland, however, with nearly 8,000,000 animals, 

 " we could count little more than 120 veterinarians. 

 Am I to understand that Scotland can only support one 

 veterinary surgeon in every 230 square miles of surface ? 

 As might have been expected, there is a greater or less 

 congregation of these 120 practitioners in the larger 

 towns; so that many considerable districts, and even 

 entire countit'S, are unprovided with practitioners of the 

 veterinary art, obviously to the serious detriment of 

 the public interest. But, even where they are congre- 

 gated, their insufficiency is toomanilest; and the far- 

 mers in the tliree Lothians can give startling testimony, 

 if asked what kind of advice is to be obtained when 

 their animals are sick, and how far they have, in tho 

 great majority of cases, to send for veterinarians. Ire- 

 laud is still worse. Nevertheless, look at the value of 

 her stock ! Is it astonishing that unqualified practi- 

 tioners and blacksmiths swarm and prosper as they do 

 throughout the land ?" 



We must be understood as taking this up altogether 

 as a farmer's question. There is none more important 

 to him, and no other ill from which he is so continual, 

 and as it would appear, so inevitable a sufferer. If this 

 cau be remedied — if we can be provided with a more 

 efficient class ofmen — if the immense losses now sustained 

 from disea.«es of stock can be alleviated, then Mr. Gamgee 

 deserves the best thanks we canofierhim. He certainly 

 takes very high ground. He quotes numerous in- 

 stances where the aid of the veterinary surgeon is now 

 altogether dispensed with, so little good has come of it. 

 He has himself gained more infonnati(m from " some 

 country blacksmiths" than from " many qualified 

 members" of his own profession. At the same time he 

 shows the immense advantage it would be, to have a 

 better organized and more reliable staff. Wo must 

 take one more extract, at least, suggestive of some 

 good to the agriculturist : — 



"Our large herbivorous quadrupeds are peculiarly liable (o 

 diseases of the digestive organs. These are very easily pre- 

 vented ; but as animals are badly kept, the prevalence of those 

 maladies is so great, that it is quite matter of surprise. As 

 I have elsewhere said, throughout Scotland devastation by 

 colic is devastation as by a plague. In Mid-Lothian, the loss 

 by colic, inflamed stomach, and inflammation of the bowels, 

 was at least 37-i per cent, of the animals that died of disease 

 in 1851, about 28 per cent, in 1852, upwards of 40 per 

 cent, in 1853, nearly the same in 1854 and 1855, and up- 

 wards of 45 per cent, in 1856. An influential farmer of 

 East Lothian, at a meeting of the Highland and Agricultural 

 Society, was alluding to tb- ravsgea produced hy this disease. 



