INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS. 
789 
times necessary to give medicines merely for the sake of ascer¬ 
taining what effect they will produce,—that there is a con¬ 
nection between disease and the remedy which cannot be 
mistaken by the man who is thoroughly indoctrinated with 
the principles of the science of therapeutics. 
Then, gentlemen, there is another subject which has lately 
been introduced here, that of practical instruction, a most 
important one to this extent, that it will enable you to 
acquire a certain amount of tact and dexterity in the per¬ 
formance of those simple duties which you will be called upon 
to at once carry out the moment you commence your practice. 
You will be taught in this division of your studies how to 
approach an animal without convincing the owner of it that 
you never did anything of the kind before; and, having 
acquired such an amount of knowledge as will enable you 
to proceed consistently and as men accustomed to the 
work, you may verysafely trust to your advancing expe¬ 
rience to make you equal to every emergency. Only he quite 
sure that you obtain the necessary scientific knowledge ; and 
with the addition of such an amount of practical tact and 
skill as you may acquire here if you choose to take the 
trouble, you need have no fear of the ultimate result. 
Now as to the course which you will find it necessary to 
pursue in order to acquire the necessary knowledge of your 
subject. The first thing that you are asked to do is to attend 
upon the course of lectures. The word is to attend; you are 
required to do that, and that is all the laws of the college can 
compel you to do. But will you permit me a moment to tell 
you what that means ? The word comes from the root 
ef tendo,” which means to stretch or strain; and if you recol¬ 
lect, we have certain words connected with it; there is such 
a thing as “ tension” and “ attentiveand, lastly, “ attend¬ 
ance.” Let me first of all tell you what attendance at 
lectures does not mean. It does not mean sketching facetious 
caricatures in your note-books. They may be excessively 
ingenious, and in some other walks of art might raise you to 
the highest pinnacle probably of artistic glory, but they are 
simply out of place here. It does not mean resting your 
heads comfortably upon your hands and simulating at least 
the appearance of sleepiness. 
Attendance, on the other hand, does mean a strain of the 
attention to catch every word which the lecturer utters; it 
means emphatically a strong mental effort. If I were talking 
to you now in some language which you scarcely understood, 
and upon a subject on which your lives depended, just im¬ 
agine how your ears would be opened to every syllable, and 
