INTRODUCTION. 



IN all ages have medical philosophers regarded a knowledge 

 of anatomy as requisite to the attainment of the science of 

 medicine ; but in no age, we may venture to assert, has the truth 

 of this opinion shone upon the mind with brighter light than at 

 the present time. In this, our own day, we may look around and 

 seem to trace the success of each one eminent in the healing art- 

 to his anatomical acquirements : at least, we may safely affirm, 

 that not one of our present medical distingues could have gained 

 the same ground without a knowledge of anatomy ; and he would 

 appear to have reached the highest station who has had the 

 wisdom and foresight to make that science the foundation of his 

 other professional pursuits. 



However much lack of knowledge and respectability on the 

 part of its practitioners may have disparaged it, the Veterinary 

 Art itself must claim kindred with human medicine, anatomy 

 and physiology being their common parents. Both sciences 

 spring from the same source, and must be attained by a like 

 course of study. The surgeon has lived to the day to be convinced, 

 that no so sure road to reputation and distinction lies open to him 

 as the broad and accessible one through the dissecting room ; and 

 the day ivill come (should it have not yet arrived) when the 

 Veterinary Surgeon will discover that the same path is the only 

 one which even he can rationally pursue. The age of grooms 

 and farriers is on the decline ; and the day fast approaching, 

 when Science must and will assert the same sway over the ve- 

 terinary profession as she so triumphantly exercises at the present 

 day over the medical world at large. 



After this encomium on anatomy, it comes very natural to 

 inquire what we learn or profit by the science. A short and pithy 

 answer (though it might be deemed an unsatisfactory one) may 

 be given to this question, by repeating, that no really useful 

 medical learning can be acquired without it. A professor of 

 medicine with a mind unfurnished with anatomy and physiology, 

 is precisely in the situation of a mechanic who undertakes to 

 repair a deranged or broken machine without any acquaintance 



