359 
MISCELLANEOUS. 
Midwives and Veterinary Surgeons. 
To the Editor of “ Paynes Leicester Advertiser .” 
SIR — In your last number is an advertisement, by a Mrs. 
Frances Simpson, midwife, (of what place is not stated, suppose 
Leicester), for a pupil. She remarks, that “ there are two male prac- 
titioners in midwifery who go out at a low charge, and many poor 
women have ventured their lives in their hands on account of it ; 
but one of them has been rather unfortunate in his practice, and 
has been in jeopardy once or twice; the other’s (the cow doctor s) 
charge is rather higher, and he has not had so much to do, and has 
hitherto escaped pretty well. If he ever has upwards of three 
hundred cases in a year, it will test his ability for midwifery.” 
I know something of the gentleman designated “the Core Doctor," 
and en passant would ask, is it any salir on him to be a member 
of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, holding a Charter 
signed by Queen Victoria] He studied at Edinburgh with the 
celebrated accoucheur, John Thatcher, M.D., two courses on mid- 
wifery, and the diseases of women and children, with a dispensary 
in connexion ; while the poor of the City were confined by the 
students under the superintendence of the doctor and assistants at 
their own houses. He subsequently was elected surgeon to a 
large parish, held that situation seven years, had at least 400 
midwifery cases annually, and up to the present period has attended 
upwards of 4000 women in child-bed, without a single death ; his 
abilities many years ago have been well tested, and some of his 
cases are before the profession : vide the Medical Times , vol. x, 
page 152, and vol. xii, page 104. Hippocrates, the father of 
physic, was a veterinary surgeon ; M. Velpeau, professor of sur- 
gery and diseases of women at la Charite, in Paris, is a veterinary 
surgeon. Midwifery is indebted to a veterinary surgeon for the 
Caesarean operation. In the year 1500, Eliza Alespachen had 
this operation performed upon her by her husband, who was a cow 
doctor, at Seigenhausen, in Germany : this is the first instance in 
which the operation was ever performed on a living patient with 
success. I could name twenty doctors of medicine and human 
surgeons that are M.R.C.V.S. He has frequently been called in 
by physicians, surgeons, and midwives, to assist them in difficult 
and dangerous cases. 
