WHY NOT BE A VETERINARY SURGEON. 
317 
become good, common-sense practitioners by dint of apply¬ 
ing their powers of observation, and reading the veterinary 
books and magazines published abroad at the time. In those 
days there were no veterinary colleges nor publications in 
the United Slates. 
The opinion that a veterinary surgeon is simply a horse 
and cow-doctor is too narrow. A well-educated veterinary 
surgeon, besides being useful as a general practitioner, can 
give valuable advice touching wide interests. His opinion 
should be sought, and his suggestions followed in outbreaks 
of contagious disease among animals, and in respect of the 
public health so far as it is influenced by these maladies. 
By far the larger number of veterinarians are and always 
will be employed in doctoring individual horses, cattle, sheep 
and other animals, but to many a wide field is and will be 
more and more afforded. The problem of keeping our flocks 
and herds in health is closely connected with that of keeping 
in health the whole body of the people; for the people in 
general consume the products of some domestic animals and 
are brought into close contact with others, while it is well 
known that the maladies of these animals may be “ caught ” 
in some form by mankind. 
Some of the official directions in which the veterinary sur¬ 
geon can act are in the army, in the work of the National 
Department of Agriculture, as scientific investigators at the 
various state agricultural experiment stations, as professors 
in the agricultural colleges, as state officials for the suppres¬ 
sion of contagious animal diseases, and as members and em¬ 
ployees of boards of health. 
In continental Europe and Great Britain the importance 
of having educated veterinarians in the army to advise in the 
purchase and to preserve the health of the cavalry, artillery 
and train horses is so well understood that veterinary officials 
are given commissions, because men of proper education and 
capability for the work cannot be procured unless accorded 
the rank, privileges and pay of officers and gentlemen. 
The English army has a regular veterinary department. 
Its chief has the rank of colonel, and those under him descend 
