VETERINARY EDUCATION AND MATRICULATES. 68l 
In Europe, a young man intending to devote his future to 
scientific pursuits, knows that he must attend a gymnasium or a 
school of similar character in order to attain the qualifications 
admitting him to college or university. Mark Twain in his 
“Tramp Abroad” gives an idea of a gymnasium training. In 
speaking of the student of Heidelberg University, he says: 
“It would be a mistake to suppose that the easy-going student 
carries an empty head. Just the contrary. He has spent nine 
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years in the gymnasium under a system which allowed him no 
freedom, but vigorously compelled him to work like a slave. 
Consequently he has left the gymnasium with an education 
that is so extensive and complete that the most a university can 
do for it is to perfect some of its profounder specialties. It 
is said that when a pupil leaves the gymnasium he not only has 
a comprehensive education, but he knows what he knows ; it is 
not befogged with uncertainties, it is burnt into him so that 
it will stay. Foreign youth steer clear of the gymnasium, its 
rules are too severe. They go to the university to put a man¬ 
sard roof on their whole general education ; but the German 
student already has his mansard roof, so he goes there to add a 
steeple in the nature of some specialty, such as a particular 
branch of law, or medicine, or philology.” 
Of course this is overdrawn, but as late as half a century 
ago, the average American’s chances for fitting himself for the 
university were meagre. Time, however, has worked changes. 
Preparatory schools as well as universities havo gradually in¬ 
creased and are to-day so numerous that any talented youth 
with an earnest desire to acquire a thorough education can do 
it. Evening sessions have even been inaugurated in the larger 
cities for the benefit of those who can not attend in the day 
time. There is nothing gained by evading the preparatory 
instructions ; the one who does it knows just that much less. 
It is through learning that the veterinary student can attain 
the gratifying reputation, the college or university credential 
(diploma), the ultimate testimonial that he has perfected himself 
in all the branches of veterinary science, which the quack or 
