I838i] Scientific Intelligence : Madras Medical School, 265 



XVI.— Scientific Intelligence; 



The Madras Medical School. 



The erection of an edifice at Madras especially devoted to the cul- 

 tivation of the different branches of the science of Medicine, and the 

 instruction of the Natives of India in that most useful and highly im- 

 portant department of knoVi^ledge, is too grand and interesting an event 

 to permit of its being unnoticed by the local scientific Journal. We 

 icanbbt but consider the introduction of a systematic plan of education 

 in Medicine as the most important step that has yet been accomplished 

 towards the mental improvement of the people of this part of India. 

 We have all heard that the Natives generally are averse from the em - 

 ployment of European remedies and plans of treatment ; their brethrenj 

 who will now receive excellent instruction, will be widely spread over 

 the country. Warm advocates, it may be supposed, for the adoption of 

 our superior modesj and desirous of rescuing their countrymen from 

 the ignorance and empiricism of their own practitioners. Another 

 point gained is that all prejudices regarding dissection are done away 

 with among those who come as students, and a foundation is thus laid 

 for the acquirement and diffusion of a knowledge of Anatomy, a scis 

 fence, which, at present, is absolutely unknown among the Natives of 

 India, and without which, we need not say, an attempt to practise 

 Medicine and Surgery is the impudent pretension of a charlatan. The 

 alumni of the New Medical School, their course of study over, will 

 be scattered in every direction, and the influence of their knowledge 

 must produce some re-action on the minds of their countrymen ; and 

 though the effect at first may be trifling, yet a momentum will be given 

 to the onward march of improvement in the course of time, and a 

 favourable effect on the intellect and character of the people of India 

 must be the result. An incidental advantage is gained, too, by the cir- 

 cumstance of all instruction being imparted in the English language ; 

 so that ripe scholars in that tongue will be formed, and thus they may 

 be weaned from the study of tbeir own authors, from whom little but 

 error and superstition is to be gained. These are the probable and 

 distant advantages to be derived ; but, in the mean time^ Government 

 and the public enjoy the positive and immediate benefit of having a 

 well-trained and well-instructed set of subordinates in the medical 

 department of the public service. 



