ROYAL AND CENTRAL SOCIETY OF AGRICULTURE. 515 
The manuscript numbered 15 bears this motto, taken from 
Boileaux — 
Aujour d’hui, toutefois, mon zMe m’encourage, 
II taut au moins du Rhin tenter Pheureuse passage; 
Un trop juste devoir veut que nous l’essayons. 
The motto is repeated in a sealed letter, which encloses the name 
of the author (M. Imlin, veterinary surgeon at Strasburg). 
The manuscript is entitled, “ The social Position of Civil and 
Military Veterinary Surgeons in the principal German States .” 
“An opinion generally prevails among French veterinarians,” 
says the author, “ that their brethren beyond the Rhine hold 
a more elevated position in society than they do, although the 
German veterinary surgeons are far less carefully educated than 
the French. This circumstance has always been much insisted 
upon by those who have endeavoured to obtain for military vete- 
rinarians a rank better fitted to the degree of instruction which 
they possess, and the importance of the services which they render 
to the state. ” This opinion the author asserts to be an error, for, 
says he, “ the first general rule in all the German states is, that 
the veterinary surgeons, whether civil or military, shall be under 
the direction of the human surgeons; 2d, there are two classes 
of veterinary surgeons, the one composed of highly educated 
scientific men, and the other of those who have merely received 
a practical education, and who are little better than empirics; 
3d, the social position of veterinary surgeons is not in accordance 
with the perfect or imperfect organization of the schools, or with 
the amount of the instruction they are capable of affording; 
4th, in those places where civil veterinary surgeons are most 
favoured, military veterinarians are least thought of, and vice 
versa ; 5th, the immense number of veterinary schools in the 
smaller states favours an imperfect system of instruction, and 
constitutes an obstacle to the progress of veterinary medicine.” 
In Austria the offices of professor to the Veterinary Institution 
at Vienna, and veterinary surgeon to the province, are bestowed 
on human surgeons, who have attended a course of veterinary 
medicine. In Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and especially 
in the petty German states, the veterinary surgeons to the pro- 
vince, the district, the town, 8cc. are all under the control of the 
surgeons and physicians of those places. Not only are they be- 
neath them in rank, but they are compelled to obey them in all 
that relates to the treatment of epizootic diseases. 
If in Bavaria, in Wurtemberg, and in the duchies of Baden 
and Hessia, where there are but few military veterinary surgeons, 
these men are ranked as lieutenants, captains, or even lieutenant- 
colonels; on the other hand, in Austria and Prussia, where there 
are greater numbers, they only rank in the former with a brigadier 
or quarter-master, and in the latter with a trumpeter. 
