308 
THE VETERINARY PROFESSION. 
termary practitioners, medical men, and sportsmen generally, 
regarded the profession with contempt; and even many of our own 
brethren, who should have known better, and ought to have done 
better, became careless and indifferent to their own respectability 
and that of their compeers, and contributed to increase the de¬ 
gradation. You have spoken of the “ mutton pie maker and ve¬ 
terinary surgeonI have seen the regularly dubbed Vet. with 
his soiled apron and blackened hands, hammering away—on 
what ?—no ; not on the shoes which were to be fitted to the feet 
of his patients, but in bitting the poker and mending the grid¬ 
iron of his neighbour: and, not a great while ago, I read, on one 
of our principal roads, “ A. B. veterinary surgeon, 14 years 
assistant at the Veterinary College , shoeing smithy and smith's 
work in all its branches Now, gentlemen, if we are sunk thus 
low by our scandalous education, and are thus wilfully contri¬ 
buting to our own debasement; if the assistants to the Veterinary 
College are blacksmiths; let me ask you, will these medical exa¬ 
miners, of whose exclusion of us you speak so much, and, to a 
great degree, so well, will they, can they admit us among them ? 
There are ranks of society the boundaries of which are clearly 
defined, and the line of demarcation rigidly guarded. The black¬ 
smith can never be the gentleman, and can never associate with 
gentlemen. 
I confess, Messrs. Editors, I think you have begun very much 
at the wrong end. In the present state of the veterinary profes¬ 
sion, you cannot establish its just claims to public regard. You 
must change the character of the profession itself. You are doing 
so to a very considerable degree. Let this be your sole object. 
Do not be deluded from it by aiming at that which is imprac¬ 
ticable. Labour to promote the spread of veterinary science, and 
the improvement of veterinary character. Let the examining 
committee alone for a while ; nay, even although they have the 
impudence to tell us they are “ the best constituted committee in 
the world.” Make veterinary surgeons what they ought to have 
been, and they will, in due time, occupy the situation which 
they ought to fill. You have wrung from the Professor the an¬ 
nouncement, that “ no veterinary pupil shall, in future, obtain 
