212 
VETERINARY JURISPRUDENCE IN SCOTLAND. 
[“ From the Scottish Farmer.”] 
Sir,— THERE is, perhaps, no position in which the veterinary 
practitioner in the north finds himself so disadvantageous^ 
situated, compared with his brethren south of the Tweed, as 
when he comes to give evidence in a court of law ; nor are there 
(in this part of the country at- least) any sort of civil law dis¬ 
putes in which more law and less justice are dispensed than 
those wherein the veterinarian is called on for his evidence. In 
England, when a man over-reaches his neighbour by selling him 
a diseased or unsound animal, the case is sent to a jury of 
twelve honest men, who, after hearing the evidence, seeing the 
appearance of the witnesses, and asking such questions as they 
may think necessary for expiscating the truth, generally manage 
to give a decision guided by common sense and common honesty. 
In Scotland, on the other hand, such causes are decided by a 
legal judge, aided by legal counsel, without viva voce examina¬ 
tion of the witnesses, and without a jury, and the turning point 
in the decision is commonly some legal technicality or quibble 
unconnected with the justice or merits of the case, and unappre- 
ciable to ordinary understandings. 
In proof of the first of the above affirmations, we could refer 
to the pages of The Veterinarian in which has been recorded, 
with almost monthly punctuality, whatever has happened of in¬ 
terest in veterinary jurisprudence in the various law courts of 
England, for the last twenty years; and in proof of the second, 
we need only to cite a case decided at last Aberdeen circuit 
(namely, that of Smith v. Rainnie), of which a garbled and one¬ 
sided report appeared at the time in the local weekly papers. 
As this case has several points in connexion with it of interest 
to the general as well as veterinary reader, we purpose making 
it the subject of a few remarks :— 
The facts of the case are, that Smith bought from Rainnie a 
cow in December, 1848—lean in condition, but presenting no 
other appearance of dishealth, and warranted sound and healthy 
by the seller. The cow shortly after calved, and went on 
seemingly well for some weeks, when she began to go off her 
feeding, and was treated by Smith, who is himself a V. S. and 
at the time believed her to be labouring under functional disease 
only. In spite of all the stimulating and restorative treatment 
that could be tried, the animal died on the 10th of April, 1849 ; 
and on Smith opening her, still having no suspicion of the ex¬ 
istence of anything beyond functional disease, a large accumu- 
