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remain some little fragment of moral or intel- 

 lectual discouragement, and therefore I will take 

 the liberty to remark that your chairman to-day, 

 if he occupied his proper place, would be among 

 them. Your chairman, in virtue of his position, 

 and for the brief hour that he occupies that 

 position, is a person of importance ; and it may 

 be some consolation to those who have failed if 

 I say, that the quarter of a century which I have 

 been speaking of, takes me back to the time when 

 I was up at the University of London, a candidate 

 for honours in anatomy and physiology, and when 

 I was exceedingly well beaten by my excellent 

 friend, Dr. Ransom, of Nottingham. There is a 

 person here who recollects that circumstance very 

 well. I refer to your venerated teacher and mine, 

 Dr. Sharpey. He was at that time one of the 

 examiners in anatomy and physiology, and you 

 may be quite sure that, as he was one of the 

 examiners, there remained not the smallest doubt 

 in my mind of the propriety of his judgment, and 

 I accepted my defeat with the most comfortable 

 assurance that I had thoroughjy well earned it. 

 But. gentlemen, the competitor having been a 

 worthy one, and the examination a fair one, I 

 cannot say that I found in that circumstance 

 anything very discouraging. I said to myself, 

 " Never mind ; what's the next thing to be 

 done?" And I found that policy of "never 



VOL. Ill X 



