NORTH OF ENGLAND VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 295 
inspire them in the future. I do not intend to weary you with a 
long address, my remarks will be brief, and will be confined to the 
present and prospective condition of veterinary surgeons. 
A veterinary surgeon of the present day ought to be a man of ’ 
respectability, a man of principle, and a man of talent. A man of 
respectability, because from his profession he is daily mixing with 
the upper classes, and he ought to be able to acquit himself in a 
manner worthy of the profession he has chosen, and attain a posi¬ 
tion in the world. A man of principle, because of the confidence 
placed in him by his employers in disputed cases, where his in¬ 
tegrity is put on trial. A man of talent, as it requires no ordinary 
degree of skill and tact to treat the diseases of our domestic ani¬ 
mals, and satisfy the minds of those clients whose confidence in 
veterinary surgeons is often of the most limited character. 
When a young man makes choice of the veterinary profession, 
he enters some veterinary school, where he undergoes a very simple 
preliminary examination. A few questions are asked, such as, Can 
you write well ? for you require to take copious notes during the 
lectures ; have you any Latin or German ? Or he gets some simple 
arithmetic account to work out as a test of his abilities ; it very 
rarely if ever happens that an applicant is rejected. He then enters 
the college as a student, and remains there for the prescribed period 
before he is eligible for presentation at the examiner’s table. We 
will suppose that he passes a fair examination and receives the 
diploma, wdiereby he is entitled to practise the veterinary art as a 
fully qualified veterinary surgeon. He then starts business for 
himself in the best and most suitable district he knows, having no 
opposition near him but the old quack of the district. At first, 
all things go smoothly on for a time, when, perhaps, a difficult case 
presents itself, taxing a young vet.’s experience and skill in no small 
degree. We will suppose he has made a mistake in the diagnosis, 
and he treats the case contrary to its requirements. The patient gets 
worse, the client becomes uneasy, he loses confidence in his medical 
attendant, and he deems it necessary to call in the old cow-leech 
wdiom he has been in the habit of employing before the veterinary 
surgeon came to the neighbourhood ; the farrier makes careful ex¬ 
amination of the case, and, diagnoses the disease correctly, 
and at once offers to perform a cure; in the course of a day or so 
a marked improvement takes place in the patient, and in a few days 
the animal is quite itself again. 
This has a damaging eSect on the veterinary surgeon’s practice. 
Instances similar in character to the above begin to multiply in his 
practice, with results analogous to the one just quoted, and, as a con¬ 
sequence, his business leaves him ; the old quack is left in full posses¬ 
sion, and rejoices greatly over the victory he has achieved. Gentle¬ 
men, cases like the foregoing are of no uncommon occurrence. Why 
is this so ? because the majority of our young men when they leave 
college are possessed of practical knowledge to a very limited extent; 
indeed, a goodly number of them never performed an operation on 
cither horse, ox, or dog, in their lives, and not a few have never 
