760 
PHARMACEUTICAL MEETING. 
secluded City Court, and never to be heard of more ? Why are those others 
touching and handling plants and flowers ? The police are most remiss: and 
positively before my very eyes, there is a third, investigating an assortment of 
chemicals. Professor Attfield exclaims with horror— u You could not have 
guessed at them had you not seen them before.” “ Excuse me,” (replies the 
student,) “ that is precisely what I should have done ?” How, and why, do you 
draw the line, what is the line, between one branch of Pharmacy and an¬ 
other ? 
But probably the students might get to know too much. One would put the 
other up to private dodges and the examination be reduced to a mere form. 
That our students should accidentally be too well instructed, is not in the 
number of my anxieties. I remark simply that if throwing these books open, 
results in candidates being thoroughly competent to understand their contents, 
this will be the brightest experiment yet made since the creation of this Society. 
When that Millennium dawns, I solemnly engage to illuminate St. George’s 
Place. What can be the wish of an examiner; what can afford him higher 
pleasure than that the examined should be equal to the ordeal? This illiberality, 
not to say injustice, implies that our examinations are a catch—a trap arranged 
to snare the candidate, a block for an anticipated stumble. 
Nothing more characterises our Examinations (a sentiment I am certain our 
excellent Inspector will confirm) than their fairness. From personal observa¬ 
tion I may say that the examiner is invariably on the side of the Examined— 
We want him to know —to have that amount of knowledge which shall compel 
future success: and it is not the object of the Board to ask quibble questions, 
answered glibly by clever superficial applicants, but misunderstood by scholars. 
Still was not the Society’s own collection mentioned formerly, and is it for- 
gotten that that interesting volume looked like a railway accident? Only re¬ 
member that 62 prescriptions formed the limit of the Society’s accommodation. 
The existence of that too bulky tome, militated against the doctrine of conti¬ 
nuity. Given the number of students, and the aid supplied and how can we 
wonder at the result ? 
But it is said, and this I cannot endure, that the students will spoil the 
books. Then somebody is to blame. Books used with love and reverence will 
remain unsoiled for years. Masters might occasionally tell those employed in 
their service, what these compilations hold : something about Sir B. Brodie 
who himself became a dispenser—and when asked the reason why, said it was 
to educate his hands—something about Dr. Paris, whose work, the Pharmaco- 
logia is up to this night, the most perfect representative of its class of Phar¬ 
maceutical Literature : something about Elliotson whose diagnosis of disease 
was thought infallible and to whom the great novelist addressed an exquisite 
dedication of his best fiction : Something about Liston, that first of operators 
—Sir Hy Halford, unrivalled as a Latinist: something about Sir Wm. Fergu¬ 
son, who once asked a London Editor whether he had not better go back to 
Scotland as he was not successful here, and who fortunately for his reputation, 
himself and science, changed his mind. No man can be a successful Physician 
whose history is devoid of interest. 
Aware of these things will students spoil the books ? I am ashamed of having 
employed so much time in their defence. Let these new volumes, soon to adorn 
our shelves, reflect credit on English Pharmacy, and be a standing memorial of 
unwonted personal kindness be placed in our Library free as air. And while I 
thank you for the patience with which you have listened to these details let me 
parody a sentence often seen in our free places of recreation. “ P'hese Gardens 
being the property of the public, they are requested to protect the flow r ers.” 
JSo I say—These books being your property, kindly keep them in good preser¬ 
vation. 
