LIVERPOOL VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 857 
Mr. Greaves then delivered the following able address on ** The 
advantages and tendencies of Veterinary Associations 
Gentlemen, —It is proper and becoming that my first remarks 
should be an expression of the sorrow I feel at the great loss your 
Association has sustained, and which we all mourn, in the death of 
your late respected President—Mr. Ellis—a gentleman highly and 
deservedly respected, not only in Liverpool, but also in Manchester, 
as well as in the Council in London ; not only as a man of honour 
and integrity, but as a man of talent and a most distinguished 
ornament of the profession to which he belonged. Rightly did my 
friend Mr. Lawson remark, in the Council Chamber, that “ the pro¬ 
fession had no truer friend than was to be found in Mr. Ellis.” 
Personally, I felt proud when apprised that you had done yourselves 
the honour of electing him your President, for such a selection 
may be said to have added a grandeur to your Association and to 
the high office he had been so worthily placed in. The honour, 
the interest, the usefulness and dignity, of the Association would 
have been in safe keeping in his hands; and full well do I know 
that you will gladly and proudly take charge of his fame and revere 
his memory. 
I leave the question of his successor entirely with yourselves, but 
I may be permitted to say it is very desirable that he should be a 
man whose social and professional position commands respect; a 
man of kind conciliatory manners, and of a courteous and gentle¬ 
manly bearing; but above all should he be sincere, intellectual, 
indefatigable, and earnest, and have his heart and soul in the in¬ 
terest and welfare of his profession. Let it be held a sacred prin¬ 
ciple that this Association shall be conducted in a fair and proper 
spirit, and that it shall require from its members the observance of 
an honorable professional conduct. Let the straightforward con¬ 
duct of its officers be such as to put an irresistible check upon any 
one who might be disposed to be so unscrupulous as to practise 
any intriguing, dissembling, or foul play, which, alas, is occasionally 
such a fruitful source of enmity and heartburning, especially in 
large towns, where competition runs high. It is one of the main 
objects of these associations to keep in check this overreaching, 
unprofessional conduct, and to create a purer and higher tone of 
professional honour. We do not expect to change the nature of 
man, or to eradicate his evil propensities or sordid passions, but we 
seek to keep them within reasonable bounds, so that w r e shall not 
go on like idle lads in the street scrambling for a few coppers thrown 
amongst them. 
I have, perhaps, had more to do with Provincial Veterinary 
Medical Associations than any other man has had. I had the high 
privilege to call together the first society of the kind in England, 
fourteen years ago. That society existed only two years. Of the 
twelve members of which it w r as composed three only remain. 
Speaking figuratively, this society may be said to have expired like 
a smiling babe in its cradle, as if it were falling asleep and 
dreaming of a glorious future. After a lapse of tw elve years I had 
xxxvil. . 55 
