PROFESSOR SPOONER’S ORATION. 735 
If this be true — if we are thus self-convicted, let us ask our- 
selves the question. Whence has this evil had its origin ? The 
answer which I am compelled to give is, mainly , in the ineffi- 
cient education of the pupil, and, to the efficient education of the 
pupil we must look for its remedy. I trust, Gentlemen, that I am 
not saying too much when I state that, of late years, in this 
respect, considerable advances have been made. More, however, 
yet remains to be achieved ; and I feel assured that 1 am ex- 
pressing the sentiments of my colleagues, in common with my 
own, when I state, that we are most anxious so to conduct the 
affairs of this Institution as to enable it to keep pace with the 
spirit of the times, and to perfect it as a school of veterinary 
medicine. I would fain hope that the period will arrive when, 
by the force of knowledge, the grand truth will be deeply im- 
pressed upon the mind of every man, that it is his duty to 
“ Cast round the world an equal eye. 
And feel for all that live.” 
The comparative anatomist is presumed to be acquainted with 
the structure and economy of the human frame, taking man as 
his standard ; and although I am willing to admit that a know- 
ledge of the anatomy of man is of infinite advantage to the 
veterinary physiologist, yet I hold that to the practitioner it is 
not essentially necessary in order to enable him to pursue his 
professional duties with satisfaction to himself and advantage to 
his patients. 
Many of the higher animals, particularly those we are most 
frequently called on to treat, in a structural or anatomical, and in 
a great degree, even, in a functional or physiological point of 
view, bear as striking an analogy to man as they do to each other. 
As illustrative of this fact I will refer you to the chylopoi'etic 
viscera, or, in other words, the digestive apparatus — that highly 
important and complicated system whose office it is to assimilate 
the material upon which an animal feeds, whether flesh or vege- 
table, to the constituents of which its body is composed. In 
order to simplify our subject, we will more especially confine our 
observations to that division of this grand system termed the 
alimentary canal, signifying the passage from the mouth to the 
anus — a continuous tube, varying in its dimensions and general 
structural development in different parts of the same animal. 
So striking, indeed, are its peculiarities in animals of different 
species, that, by a cursory description of them, I shall be 
enabled to shew you that there is no greater semblance between 
