VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 705 
feeble labours coupled with so noble an object as that of the present 
meeting. 
I have been spoken of as editor of The Veterinarian. I must be per- 
mitted to say, with my friend Mr. Spooner, that it has become a most useful 
volume of reference, — it contains a fund of invaluable information. I say 
this freely and proudly, for I am only one, and a humble contributor to that 
fund. One object of this periodical — the diffusion of useful knowledge — has 
been gloriously accomplished ; and in my own name, and that of hundreds 
of its readers, I tender my warmest thanks to the contributors to its pages. 
With the diffusion of useful knowledge is inseparably connected the im- 
provement of our art, and its increased character and acceptation. I can 
proudly say, that this has never been lost sight of in The Veterinarian. 
The plan for the conduct of that work, laid down in the early part of the first 
volume, has never been essentially departed from. I challenge contradiction 
here. It is this — forgive my egotism ; I will not intrude long on you — it 
is this which has enabled The Veterinarian to repel all its enemies. 
Malignity and falsehood — systematic duplicity and deadly hatred, have again 
and again mustered in formidable array against it; but it lives, in the lan- 
guage of my friend, “the only established journal of veterinary science 
and it will live — foe after foe will oppose it in vain — it will live — until it 
deserts its principles, and then it will fall, and deservedly so. As to other 
works, more properly mine, they must be left to their fate. The present 
generation, and future ones, will decide on them, and they will decide truly ; 
but while even the eloquence "of my friend could not establish in public 
estimation that which is unworthy of it, calumny, hatred, and the ridicu- 
lous and malignant affectation of forgetfulness, will not injure the meanest 
of my labours. 
My name has been coupled with this noble Association, the anniversary 
of which we are commemorating. It was a chance that this Association had 
not been strangled in its birth. If certain gentlemen, whom I have in my 
mind’s eye, had not, all attentive to your interests, read the signs of the 
times, and seized the critical moment, you would not have been sheltered 
within the walls of the Veterinary College. Thanks to those who were pro- 
vident and determined, the Association was formed and located where your 
interests demanded that it should be. I have nothing to claim here, sir, but 
that of which no one can deprive me, — the consciousness of labouring 
with others more effective but not more zealous than myself in forming an 
association whose object, whose regulations, whose meetings, hitherto are 
most honourable and most intimately connected with the welfare and 
onward progress of our profession. I shall not live to see it, but if the 
members of this society are but faithful to themselves and to their noble 
cause — if they make one sacred vow to crush accidental or wilful, dis- 
sension in its very bud, the Veterinary Medical Association will ultimately 
rival in utility and in honourable acceptation the highest and the best insti- 
tutions of the kind which our country contains. Mr. President and Gentle- 
men, I humbly thank you. 
Mr. Spooner proposed the healths of those to whom certificates of merit 
had been awarded. They were the first-fruits of this noble enterprize, and 
we might draw from them the happiest presages. Was it not a noble thing 
that in this first anniversary, not only were so many certificates of merit 
awarded, and honourably earned, but we are enabled to offer prizes — and 
he trusted annual prizes — prizes increasing in number and in value, and for 
which every member of the profession might compete? This was, indeed, 
beginning already to realize the beautiful presages to which they had 
