6 MR. percivall’s introductory lecture 
public school, over which St. Bel was to preside. That St. Bel 
was a man who possessed some considerable store of medical 
knowledge, I believe all who knew him will admit: at the same 
time, every one who stood beside him at the time he was at the 
College, and who themselves had any knowledge of veterinary 
matters, are agreed that, so far as a veterinary professor was 
wanted, he was not, to the degree that might have been expected 
or desired, qualified to undertake such an office. However, he 
held it but a very short time : hardly was the erection of the 
present college at St. Pancras (which was intended but as tem¬ 
porary and preliminary to something better) completed, when 
St. Bel died, leaving the art in but little better condition than 
that in which he had found it. 
Among one of the first operations that was performed by St. 
Bel, at the College, was the excision of two redundant or acces¬ 
sory feet (in a case of Insiis naturae ), which grew from the fet¬ 
locks of the two fore legs. He operated on one leg at a time. 
In the first operation, which he performed with considerable 
anxiety, from the apprehension of the superfluous growth com¬ 
municating with the fetlock joint, he was assisted by the re¬ 
nowned John Hunter, who, on seeing him remove the part with¬ 
out providing any flap of integument to cover the wound after¬ 
wards, advised him, the next time he operated, to make a provi¬ 
sion of the sort. The consequence of which friendly and useful 
hint was, that the parts healed in half the time after the second 
operation that they did after the first. That St. Bel, however, 
had he lived, would have placed the art upon a scientific basis, 
may be augured from a passage which I shall here read to you, 
out of a very commendable work he has left us, entitled, “ Obser¬ 
vations on the Art of Veterinary Medicine. ” The passage runs as 
follows :—“ The object of this art is therefore not only congenial 
with that of human medicine, but the very same paths which 
lead to a knowledge of the diseases of man, lead equally to those 
of brutes. An accurate examination of the interior parts of their 
bodies; a studious survey of the arrangement, structure, form, 
connexion, use, and relation of these parts, and of the laws by 
which they are intended to act; as also of the nature and pro¬ 
perty of the various foods, and other agents, which the earth so 
liberally provides for their support and cure: these form, in a 
great measure, the sound and sure foundation of all medical 
science, whatever living individual animal is the subject of our 
consideration.” This, gentlemen, is sound and wholesome doc¬ 
trine, and such as could not have failed to have set our art upon 
a sure and firm basis : whatever, therefore, may be said of the de¬ 
ficiencies of St. Bel in practical matters, his name must ever stand 
