On the study of veterinary medicine : being an inaugural address at the opening og the Edinburgh New Veterinary school / by John Gamgee.

  • Gamgee, John, 1831-1894.
Date:
1857
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the study of veterinary medicine : being an inaugural address at the opening og the Edinburgh New Veterinary school / by John Gamgee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    small, it is always large enough amply to repay a Veterinarian to adopt an honest and disinterested line of conduct. There is a spot in Aberdeenshire where six or seven Veteri¬ narians are at a short distance of each other, ihey all appeal to understand so little about the prevention and cure of disease, that application was made to me from a farmer s club foi a skil¬ ful Veterinarian to go amongst the rest. Enough was promised to enable a person to venture against severe opposition , and the right man might undoubtedly prove himself to be in the right place, both as it concerned himself or his patrons. Near to that same district, about forty years ago, a quiet unob¬ trusive young surgeon commenced his labours amongst the suffering of his kind. The quack, or the routine and igno¬ rant practitioner, kept up a fierce contest for a prolonged period, but the young surgeon’s sterling merit and extensive acquirements rendered him too confident to succumb, and too strong to be beaten. His name spread from the quiet village to be universally known and revered wherever medicine is taught. Ear from the towns, which are looked upon as the seats of learning, at a distance from libraries, and deprived of the healthy influence of association with men of his tastes and of his profession, he worked for science, for medicine, with such zeal and talent, that his works are with many the con¬ stant theme of admiration. This is what a country practi¬ tioner of human medicine has done, and what is perfectly within the reach of the instructed Veterinarian. But I am longing for the day to come when it will be recog¬ nised, that young men cannot learn as much as they require very easily in a very short time; that all they need through life is that amount which may be considered sufficient to stand an hour’s examination. In this way they soon believe they are sufficiently well-informed for every purpose, and they never can attain that condition to derive real pleasure in search of information for its own sake, with an ever-widening