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PROFESSIONAL DEPRESSION. 
lame, for want of such assistance. The second will “ doctor” his 
own horse ; at all events for awhile. The third will abide by what 
his all-knowing groom says, consoling himself that he has such a 
sagacious adviser, until the time comes for him to discover that his 
factotum has, with his misapplied nostrums, brought his valuable 
and favourite servant to a state beyond either recovery to health or 
restoration to soundness. Too often, however, does it happen that, 
notwithstanding the most cruel errors committed and the most 
sinister results felt, studs of horses are, one after another, sacrificed 
through ignorance of this sort, either to feed the vanity or pre- 
sumption of man or master, who imagines himself (his knowledge 
having come to him through birth or instinct) a perfectly informed 
horse-doctor. And we are afraid that this self-doctoring practice 
is becoming more frequent than it used to be, and for two reasons, 
one being that people, growing more saving, are apt to consider 
more what is likely to be the amount of the “ doctor’s bill the 
other, that they learn, or think they can learn, more than they could 
formerly from books of various kinds on the subject. 
Such being some of the leading causes of the acknowledged de- 
pression under which veterinary practitioners are at present labour- 
ing, the question naturally suggests itself to the inquiring mind, 
Is there any thing that can be pointed at in the shape of a remedy 
for such depression, or as a counter-active to the causes most 
influential in its production 1 The life of a horse, unlike the life 
of a man, is unfortunately but too commonly held to be valuable or 
worth preserving only in so far as the cost of the animal is to be 
considered, or as what he is actually worth or would fetch at 
market. Humanity, philanthropy, run to the aid of the sick man ; 
but does the same spirit visit the sick horse 1 — or is it only be- 
cause he is worth so much that he finds help in his day of suffer- 
ing ? Is the poor jaded hack-horse attended like the pampered 
palfrey, whose equal or superior in worth, once on a time, he was 1 
What can be done — can any thing be done to insure a more exten- 
sive veterinary attendance, — to induce all persons having sick or 
lame horses to employ those whose business and profession it is to 
cure them ; — to enable the poor man even to seek veterinary aid 
for his poor though to him valuable horse 1 
Some time ago there was a rumour about an Insurance Company 
