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VETERINARY BOARDS OF EXAMINATION. 
art. Perhaps, too, you will be kind enough to inform me, what 
really valuable “ rights, privileges, or immunities,” a member of 
the body politic will enjoy, of which I shall be deprived, provided 
my professional capabilities are considered by the public equal 
to his. 
I am ignorant of the management of the institution to the abuses 
of which the greater part of Mr. Mayhew’s letter refers ; but I am 
convinced that, from the manner and circumstances under which 
his statements are made, they will but at best, and if correct, fall 
pointless on your readers. In speaking of the subject, and the 
Board of Examiners to which I am especially alluding, there are 
other remarks of his which more immediately concern me. His 
statement, that “ no man of character could sit on such a board” 
had better have been withheld until he had seen of whom the 
board was to be composed. I can assure him that this gratuitous 
testimony to character will not apply to the Edinburgh Board, 
which consists of men to whom no one can possibly impute want 
of character or reputation, without being thoroughly ashamed of 
the existing Board of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons 
which examines at this school. 
We have had enough of examiners of whom the remark would 
have been peculiarly appropriate, as alluding to men whose know- 
ledge of the English language can scarcely render them intelligible 
to those they address, and whose only public appearances are as 
annual Examiners for the body politic. A candidate rejected by 
such a Board suffers little disgrace ; a person possessing a diploma 
with such names attached, may become a member of the body po- 
litic and corporate, yet he cannot but consider that ten guineas 
spent on such a document is wasted, whilst there is a chance of 
obtaining another signed by men of known scientific reputation, 
before whom it is a true honour to pass a successful examination, 
and by whom it is a real disgrace to be rejected. 
Mr. Mayhew says, that the assertion regarding the establishment 
of another Examining Board is a “puerile” threat — that the “idea 
is preposterous,” — and makes other vague and premature assertions 
in endeavouring to ridicule the probability of such a measure being 
carried out. It seems, however, that he is really “ fearing the 
possibility of such an event,” and admits that, when diplomas are 
granted by two different examining bodies, “ the false and true 
paper will be confounded.” So far, indeed, has this fear gone, 
that a model of the Crest of the Royal College has been prepared 
for the members of the Incorporation. But does it not occur to 
Mr. Mayhew, that if the diploma of the Royal College stand in 
need of any other than its own recommendation, it will surely be 
most humiliating for its possessors to be driven to the “ puerile ” 
