FROM THE EXAMINING COMMITTEE. 293 
no supposed enemies to thwart; or that, unknowingly and unde- 
signedly influenced by prejudice, they may bestow their diploma 
on the ignorant, and refuse it to the deserving ? 
We will not, we do not imagine that flagrant injustice would or 
could be committed by honourable men; but we do recollect, many 
a year ago, that the decisions of the examining committee were 
occasionally passing strange. We have seen those with whom 
we had dissected, and read, and conversed, and closely studied 
month after month, whom we knew to be indefatigable, and 
believed to be competent, turned back; while others (we had 
repeatedly ground one person now in our mind’s eye), who knew 
neither the number nor the relative situation of the humours of 
the eye, and to whom we would not have entrusted the treatment 
of a poor ass, passed without difficulty. It could not be that 
the former had thought for himself, and would not blindly 
subscribe to any creed, and that the other had got by rote certain 
answers to certain questions on certain points. 
We will not speak of the impression, injurious and too lasting, 
which might be made on our minds, and those of others ; but 
these cases of undesigned injustice must necessarily occur, when 
the majority of the examiners can only enquire into general 
principles, and are guided in the application of them to the 
domestic quadruped by one, or their prejudice in favour of the 
opinions of one, highly talented indeed, but liable to error. 
Is it necessaiy further to urge a case so plain? How came 
these gentlemen to be appointed to this important office ? At the 
establishment of the college there were no veterinaiy surgeons. 
Before the art had been taught among us there could be none 
sufficiently instructed, and the governors were obliged to be 
content with the best examiners they could get,—human prac¬ 
titioners, deservedly eminent in their own profession, to whom 
the college was indebted for its veiy existence, and who were 
most anxious for its success. It was not dreamed of, that they 
who were elected, because better men could not be procured, 
should continue exclusively to occupy the examiners’ board, when 
hundreds of veterinary surgeons were distributed through the 
kingdom. 
Among all these, are there none sufficiently honourable and well 
