October 13, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



459 



us as a heritage from the great leaders in 

 chemistry, physiology and pathology. The 

 analyst finds in many of our systems the 

 presumptuous effort to correlate the basic 

 sciences into a workable unit in men who 

 do not possess the first principles of chem- 

 istry, physics and biology and to instruct 

 such undisciplined men in the many com- 

 plicated topics that must find place in a 

 modex-n veterinary curriculum in the brief 

 period of a few short months. While per- 

 haps in earlier years, before there were 

 public schools, and when our curricula 

 were less crowded, these methods met the 

 requirements, the time has come when they 

 remind one of the legend of the clock. It 

 is said that in one of the old towers of 

 Europe there was a clock. As time went 

 on the hands dropped off and the figures 

 on the dial became obliterated; but the 

 sexton, grown old in service, ascended the 

 ladder every week and wound the slowly 

 rusting spring and the clock kept ticking, 

 ticking, while all those who came to learn 

 the time of day went away disappointed, 

 for it told them nothing. A like experi- 

 ence, as proved by many statements from 

 agriculturists, is all too often recorded by 

 those who, in trying to save their suffering 

 animals, have witnessed the hopeless efforts 

 of men who have mistaken diplomas for 

 knowledge and who have sought to be prac- 

 tical without possessing the knowledge with 

 which to aid the sick individual to set 

 aright the disharmonies in the physical 

 body. 



Although it is easier to tear down than 

 to build up, it is not my purpose to dwell 

 upon the things we wish were not, but 

 rather to point to the broad foundations 

 that have been and are being laid and to 

 the towers of strength and service that 

 sooner or later must rise upon these foun- 

 dations. The first and most important 

 stone that is being placed in the foundation 



for a better and more efficient veterinary 

 education is the training of the owners of 

 animals in the basic sciences upon which 

 veterinary art itself is founded. The 

 teaching in chemistry, botany, physiology 

 and bacteriology given in our agricultural 

 colleges is removing from the minds of men 

 the mask concerning the nature of disease 

 and its treatment that superstition has long 

 held in place. The truth uttered by John 

 Hunter centuries ago that diseases should 

 be studied as objects of natural history has 

 been accepted. It is now recognized that 

 when there is a disability of the body or a 

 morbid process there is some physical 

 cause; and that the remedy lies in render- 

 ing the inflicted individual some definite 

 assistance to the methods nature herself has 

 provided to defend the body against such 

 irritants, whatever they are, or to heal the 

 injuries produced. The principles of im- 

 munity as laid down and demonstrated 

 by Metehnikoff and Ehrlich are being out- 

 lined in readers for pupils in the common 

 schools. The U. S. Bureau of Animal 

 Industry, experiment stations and agri- 

 cultural colleges are popularizing tech- 

 nical knowledge and sending it broadcast 

 throughout the country in bulletins and 

 circulars so that those who escape the col- 

 lege curriculum are caught in the coils of 

 these popular mechanisms for instruction. 

 With a clientele versed in the very sciences 

 that must be applied by the veterinarian, 

 can a practitioner hope for success, or even 

 for a chance of success, if he himself is not 

 in possession of a still greater knowledge 

 of these same subjects? 



A second stratum in our foundation is 

 the gradual differentiation of a group of 

 sciences and their special development for 

 the purpose of promoting the practise of 

 veterinary medicine. Until recently, and 

 in certain places, this still obtains, there has 

 been the tendency to instruct students of 



