CORRESPONDENCE. 
499 
ness of detail, as is observed with apprentices sent to learn a 
trade. It may be urged that ours is a profession and not a trade, 
and that for this reason, and because many have attained their 
majority before beginning their professional studies, students of 
medicine should have more liberty of action regarding their du¬ 
ties. This is true in a sense, for it is generally conceded that men 
are the best judges of their own opportunities to acquire knowl¬ 
edge, and that it is some what degrading to the independent scientific 
student, to be under obligations to perform duties, that in many 
instances, partake strongly of simple unskilled manual labor. 
But this, in great part, is a mistaken conception of what really 
constitutes a thoroughly educated professional man. There is no 
work, no single detail, belonging to the entire practice of the science 
of veterinary medicine, which should not be thoroughly understood 
by the accomplished veterinarian; the coarser details can nowhere be 
so fully and readily learned as in the office and infirmary of the 
private practitioner. Many of the things which he will learn 
there, it is true, he may never be called upon to perform when in 
practice for himself; but unless he knows how they should 
be done, and how to do them, he is not competent to instruct,. Of 
the minor operations, all manipulations and the application of hy¬ 
gienic principles, in no place can he obtain a better practical 
knowledge than with the practitioner, who has but the one to 
teach, and the opportunity and time to determine that the sub¬ 
ject is thoroughly comprehended. 
Students who take office instruction learn, also, many of the 
habits of animals, and especially how to handle them; learn to ob¬ 
serve the general symptoms of sickness; how to administer med- 
cines and to compound them; how to study, what to study; 
acquaint themselves with technical language, and, one of the most 
important of all things, learn how to do business. To this claim of 
advantages accruing to the student, perhaps some will interpose the 
objection, that the student is liable to learn many things which do 
not accord with the teachings at college, owing to the busy prac¬ 
titioner getting rusty on many subjects, and not keeping up to 
times as regards the daily advancement of science. Here, again, 
the objection is but partly valid, for while he may learn a few old 
