972 
GLASGOW VETERINARY COLLEGE. 
measures. And if so we may yet live to see that blessed period 
for stock proprietors when epizootic pleuro-pneumonia, like 
rinderpest, shall only be remembered as a scourge of the past. 
(Applause.) 
And now, briefly, let me draw your attention to the practical 
examination of veterinary students. Hitherto it has been the 
universal custom only to apply an oral test to candidates for 
diplomas of the Boyal College, and it is not as yet contemplated to 
make any fundamental alteration on this principle or to substitute 
a written for an oral examination. But in addition to the oral 
it has been decided by the Council of the Licensing College to 
subject each student, prior to the oral examination, to a practical 
examination of horses, cattle, sheep, and dogs in their presence. 
And, gentlemen, I heartily concur in the advisability and utility 
of the step, and shall do all in my power to assist the examiners 
in carrying out the programme, and above all endeavour to teach 
you how to discharge this most important branch of your pro- 
fessional training with credit to yourself and satisfaction to your 
examiners. 
In my capacity of practitioner and teacher of the veterinary 
art, I am so placed that of necessity, if not choice, I must hold 
an opinion upon any material alteration which takes place in the 
teaching and licensing of our students, and I have not the least 
hesitation in affirming’ that the practical test will work a mighty 
reformation. Like most educational reforms, it must of necessity 
be conservative, and it will to a certainty press the spur closer to 
the rib of the aspirant to honour and recognition than has hitherto 
been the custom. And for this reason you, gentlemen, who now 
listen to me may consider that you have a cause of complaint 
over and above your predecessors who filled these benches, and 
have now been admitted within the profession. But, gentlemen, 
new lines must fall somewhere, and if they have fallen on your 
shoulders first, rest assured they will descend with greater force 
upon your successors’. 
But, putting present feelings aside, this measure will benefit 
the student, the profession, and the public. It must be admitted 
that hitherto the bulk of veterinary students, at the date of 
receiving their diplomas and entering the profession, have been 
sadly deficient in practical detail. Some unable to tell the age of 
a horse, others not positive of the individual limb, far less of the 
exact seat of the lameness affecting the animal. And whose fault 
has this been? Certainly not the teachers’ — (applause) — but 
the students’ fault, and the system of licensing. The tests of 
admission to the profession being theoretical, and not practical, 
your predecessors eagerly seized every opportunity of becoming 
more and more crammed with theory, but the practical not being 
in request was left to look after itself ; and, accordingly, I repeat 
the bulk of young veterinarians licensed to practise have been 
deficient in the practical details, — a deficiency in many instances 
so apparent as to have been remarked by non-professional on- 
