VETERINARY EXAMINING COMMITTEE. 367 
infant schools of England or of France, to trust the reputation 
and future fortune of the pupil to the decision of one or two men. 
At St. Pancras, certain eminent and honourable practitioners of 
human medicine were associated with the professors of the college, 
because we had no .veterinarians to place there; but in France, 
where the art had been longer and better studied, the veterinary 
, surgeons practising in the metropolis were formed into a jury, 
before whom the students were to appear, and by whose decision 
they were to stand or fall. ('Vide Instructions VctcrinaireSy 
tom. i, 87, and tom. hi, 45.) 
When the experiment had been fairly tried, and the public in¬ 
terest and the public voice demanded the permanent establish¬ 
ment of the French school, eveiy instruction which was necessary 
for the perfect education of the pupil was provided for within the 
walls of the college, and no less than seven professors were ap¬ 
pointed. They could not all be influenced by favouritism, and to 
a court thus numerously constituted the decision might safely be 
left. Yet even on these seven a very important restraint was laid. 
Their meetings were held at specific times. They were public. 
The friends of the pupils, the friends of the art, might be and were 
present, and one of the chief officers of government presided at 
the sitting. 
When the time arrives, and it is near at hand, that a 
more adequate system of education is adopted in the English 
veterinaiy school,—when the pupils receive at that school, and 
from the professors of that school, all the instruction which is re¬ 
quisite to enable them creditably to practise the veterinary art 
in all its branches,’^—when (we ask not for the whole seven of 
the French college) four or five professors are, as they ought to be, 
appointed, and the meetings of the examiners are held at spe¬ 
cific and .well-known times, and are public, we will withdraw our 
suit; we will fully entrust to such persons the office of censors, 
for they will not, they cannot materially do wrong, and those only 
will be admitted to practise who will not disgrace the profession. 
But while, for many years, we had but one professor at the ex¬ 
aminers^ board, and now have only two^ we claim the privilege 
which was granted to practitioners in a sister kingdom, and de¬ 
mand that we, who alone can render valuable assistance to these 
