FRENCH ARMY VETERINARY SURGEONS. 317 
either for better or worse, be much more advantageously rendered 
by the veterinary surgeon himself ? Who is more interested than 
he in the cure of his patients, and in “ classing them according 
to their diseases V’ 
I trust that I have shewn, by the preceding remarks, that the 
real cavalry veterinary surgeon is not he who bears that title 
and its distinctive insio;nia, but the ridino;-master. 
O' o ^ ^ 
Thus, then, in France they have deemed it necessary to invest 
a man elevated in rank with the care of the health of the cavalry 
horses ; but this man is not, as in Germany, England, Russia, 
Denmark, Sweden, Sic., one who has devoted himself to previous 
medical study, and is furnished with a veterinary diploma: he is 
here the riding-master. 
I request M. le Ministre’s permission briefly to compare the 
education of each of these persons. 
The riding-masters, pupils of the royal riding school, have, 
during two years, gone through a complete course of military 
riding, cavalry manoeuvres. Sic. Sic.; to which is added (and 
there is little more than the name of it) some lessons on the ex¬ 
terior of the horse, the nomenclature of his bones and of his vis¬ 
cera, and, perhaps, some general notions of his regimen. This 
course is acknowledged to be only secondary, and is considered 
merely as a form. 
The veterinary surgeons, on the contrary, apply themselves, 
during four years, to the study of the most minute anatomical 
organization of the horse; the history, general and minutely de¬ 
tailed, of every change of which his frame is susceptible, and the 
relation between organization and function. They have called 
to their aid (solely for the purpose of better studying his proper 
regimen and therapeutical treatment), topography, geology, me¬ 
teorology, rural economy, chemistry, physic, pharmacy, botany, 
&c. See.; yet all these studies cannot, it seems, be placed in the 
balance against the erudition of the school at Saumur, where 
they do not dissect ten horses in a year. 
We know not how certainly to assign the cause of this degra¬ 
dation of the cavalry veterinary surgeon, or the origin of the false 
position in which he is placed ; yet, on close examination, per¬ 
haps we may imagine it to be indicated in the fourth section of 
the decree of January 1813. In fact, we read in paragraph three 
of this section, under the title of Regimental Veterinary Sur¬ 
geons,” and at the 40th article, as follows : — 
There shall he, in each of our regiments of can airy or train of 
artillery, a chief veterinary farrier and a second veterinary 
farrier ; those who are at present in the regiments shall class under 
these denominations: the oldest shall take the title of first veteri- 
vor.. VI. s 
