592 
THE IMPROVEMENT IN 
deviations as the animal body directed in comparison with the 
human. This work Professor Coleman well and quickly per- 
formed. With the besom of medical science he unsparingly 
swept away all the hotch potch with which he found the wheels 
of improvement clogged ; and though, in his hurry to get rid of 
the rubbish, he on many occasions ejected that which he was forced 
at some future time to receive back again, yet in this manner 
did he accomplish a much quicker reform than would have been 
effected by one disposed to sift more narrowly the old materials. 
Thus was veterinary medicine in a short time invested with much 
of the “art and mystery” of human surgery; and thus it was 
that the veterinary practitioner found himself so soon placed along- 
side of the surgeon. Coleman was bred a surgeon. On surgical 
principles he framed and taught the veterinary art; and though, 
from want of practical horse-knowledge, he ran into all sorts of 
occasional errors, yet in the main he was right, and ultimately 
completely established the art he professed upon the ground-work 
of science. Both the farrier and groom would often laugh at his 
new-fangled doctrines, and on some occasions would, on account 
of their erroneous tendency in practice , do so with reason : the 
Professor, however, was too good a tactician to suffer these little 
exceptions to the general rules to dismay him, and possessed too 
keen a knowledge of physiology not speedily to turn them to 
his own account. 
When once a scientific turn had been given to it, the progress 
of the veterinary art became rapid and uninterrupted. Moor- 
croft, Blaine, Peall, Clarke, and others, were engaged in the 
good cause ; and those who came to the College as pupils were 
no sooner transformed into veterinary surgeons than they, in 
their turn, became contributors to the general stock of know- 
ledge. Every one felt desirous to make some “ discovery ;” 
and though then, as now, a great many discoveries and inven- 
tions were produced that had been made in ages preceding by 
men silent in their tombs, still the thirst for innovation did good, 
either in bringing something before the public that really was 
new , or in preserving something from oblivion that really was 
old. 
There were two subjects to which Coleman paid especial at- 
