CHARLATANISM IN FRANCE. 633 
‘ Many members, and among others M. Velpean, thought that 
the case reported by M. Vassal, was one of pure neurosis. 
M. Lepellitier established a distinction between neurosis and 
rabies. ** It is rabies,” said he, when the saliva of an animal 
or of man can, by inoculation, communicate the same disease to 
other animals.” It will likewise be of importance to ascertain 
the fact, whether, in rabid hydrophobia, the sublingual pustules 
that have been described by certain authors have any existence. 
M. Flandrin said, that rabies did not develope itself until a cer¬ 
tain time after the inoculation or the bite, and that usually 
between twenty and forty days ; but that, in the case reported by 
M. Vassal, the nervous affection was the immediate result of the 
irritating injection. 
M. Guillemot cited certain experiments that had been made in 
Italy, proving that the rabid virus of animals produces rabies only 
within certain limits. Thus, in four dogs successively inocu¬ 
lated, the one from the other, madness will develope itself in the 
three first alone. The same experiments were tried at Alfort; 
but they were not pursued, on account of the difficulty and danger- 
which necessarily attended them. 
CHARLATANISM IN FRANCE. 
M. Roche Lubin, of Saint-Affrique. 
[We translate some extracts from a letter of M. Roche Lubin, 
addressed to M. Renault, one of the Editors of the Recueil. 
It may amuse our readers a little. We are not quite so bad in 
England, although our profession, recognized and protected by 
law in France, is here impoliticly and cruelly abandoned.— Edit.] 
In my town. Saint-Affrique, there are four shoeing smiths, 
either ironmongers or blacksmiths, who publicly practise vete¬ 
rinary medicine. In the town they take the title of marechaiix 
expert; in the country they call themselves veterinary sur- 
* The French marechtl, we believe, is the man who for<^es horses’ shoes, 
and puts them on the feet, and is not supposed to do any thing- more: the 
mare'chal ca'pert, sometimes means a veterinarian who carries on shoeing; 
but oftencr it means a j)erson who, not having attended, or sufficiently so, 
any of the veterinary schools, has obtained from some veterinary institution 
or veterinary surgeons, certificates of capacity or skill; and these exa¬ 
minations cannot be granted except on the recommendation of some per¬ 
sons by whom he has been employed. On the receipt of such recommenda¬ 
tion, the institution or surgeons examine him, and decide as they think 
right; and in virtue of their certificate he may practise the veterinary 
art.— Edit. 
VOL. VIII. 4 It 
