I 
INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 695 
of a population of 8,000,000 nearly 3,000,000 received food 
gratuitously on July 3rd, 1847; and the mortality reached 
almost 1,000,000 while the famine lasted. Many thousand 
people, moreover, panic-stricken, fled the country. 
Unquestionably the determining cause of the great Irish 
famine and pestilence of 1845-50 was the failure of the potato 
crop ; but one source of the destructiveness of this visitation— 
a chief cause, indeed, of the little power of resistance against 
its evil influence—was that impairment of vitality and in¬ 
ability to contend against disease, which was associated with 
a deprivation of animal food, to which the bulk of the popu¬ 
lation had been subjected for several years. The absence of 
such deprivation, and of that deterioration of stamina which 
is occasioned by it, I do not hesitate to say has exercised a 
most important effect in hitherto arresting epidemic disease 
among the Lancashire cotton-weavers, who are unfortunately 
suffering from famine at the present time. 
If it were requisite, I could parallel this sad story by 
others from the history of this country and Continental states ; 
but this will suffice for the lesson 1 wish to teach. 
It is evident that of the two great causes of the Irish famine 
and pestilence of 1845-50, the failure of the staple animal 
and vegetable food of the people, man was powerless except 
in so far as he might mitigate the former. He could not 
turn back the seasons in their course, nor hold in check the 
fierce winds, nor bind the tempest-burdened clouds, nor 
compel the fervid sunbeam. He could solely bow with 
submission to the infinite Will which had, in its inscrutable 
wisdom, permitted the desolating blight to sweep over the 
land. But he could do much to stay the ravages of the deadly 
epizootics. Here he was not altogether powerless. He might 
often save many flocks and herds. It is not in the midst 
of pestilence and famine, however, that this work has to be 
done, but in the times of plenty and of health. And it is the 
office of the veterinary practitioner to do this. This is his 
mission, a mission which elevates his calling beyond the 
restricted and ignoble aim of a mere money-getting art— 
elevates it from a simple commercial calling into an 
honorable and honoured profession. 
When, therefore, we are called upon to deal with outbreaks 
of disease such as that of smallpox in sheep, it is not the 
immediate effects alone, but also the remote, that we have to 
consider; not the interest of the agriculturist solely, but of the 
community also—remember the latter consideration heightens 
the sense of duty arising from the former. In this manner 
you may in some measure estimate the true gravity of the 
