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LIVERPOOL VETERINARY :\IEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 
to practise the veterinary art, you are at once told by the professors 
that they have all along admitted that they cannot teach a youth 
the practical knowledge of his profession fully in two sessions, the 
thing is impossible, the fault does not lie with them. You may 
then go to the Council and Examining Board, and complain to 
them that numbers of young men emerge from out of their hands 
with a diploma who are wholly incompetent to practise the veterinary 
art; here you are at once told that neither Council nor Examiners 
have any voice in the matter of examining the youth as to his 
fitness or capacity, in respect to his education, as he enters the 
college; neither have they anything to do with the sort of teaching 
at the colleges, that the fault does not lie with them. Thus, you 
see, as things are now, nobody is to blame, and thus matters go on. 
The youth is placed in a false position, and the public is led to place 
their trust often upon a broken reed. 
Gentlemen, the cry everywhere is—it is pronounced loud and 
deep, and I fully and most heartily coincide with it—that there 
should be only one head, and that head to be held responsible for 
any and all shortcomings or defects in the system of educating and 
teaching the veterinary student. 
I believe there is a perfect unanimity of opinion amongst the 
members of this Association upon this point; it is, I am convinced, 
the same amongst the members of the Lancashire Association, the 
Yorkshire Association, the Midland Counties Association, the West 
of England Association, the North of England Association, and also 
the Eastern Counties Association, viz. if it is a fact that the Council 
have not any power in these matters it should possess the power. 
Istly. The Council should have the power to fix what should be 
the minimum of education possessed by the youth when he presents 
himself to enter the college. 
2ndly. The Council should appoint the initiatory examiners. 
3rdly. The Council should have the power of a general super¬ 
vision over the teaching of the student while in the college, the 
manner and nature of the teaching, and of securing his presence 
at every lecture, and also of giving him every opportunity to see 
every examination and every operation. I do not say the Council 
should have power to interfere in the internal business of the 
institution in its character of a commercial enterprise. 
4thly. The Council should possess the power to appoint all the 
professors as well as the examiners. In short, the duties of the 
Council should comprehend the whole system of education and 
examination of the veterinary student. And then the public and 
the parents of [the youths who are now or who will hereafter be at 
the colleges would have more confidence in us, would know exactly 
whom to complain to, and who are the parties who are accountable 
and responsible, and to whom they may look to supply a remedy. 
Let the examiners be elected for five or ten years, instead of for 
life, as they are now. Let the Board of Examiners be recon¬ 
structed, and be composed of none but veterinary surgeons. The 
services of the medical element will be ever remembered with feelinss 
O 
