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imply, a certain amount of knowledge of physiology and ofthe different forms of disease, which knowledge the studentdoes not acquire till the second year in the first case, andthe third and fourth in the last. However, as his hearerswere obliged to devote themselves to the different subjectsin the order they were prescribed, all he could say was:Attend diligently to the lectures delivered upon that subject,and take advantage of the thorough and practical teachingin the dispensary of the hospital.Mr. Reid concluded by recapitulating the facilities which

St. Thomas’s Hospital affords for students to acquire aknowledge of the subjects he had mentioned, and pointingcut the importance of attendance at lectures and classexaminations.

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UNIVERSITY COLLEGE HOSPITAL.

INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS BY DR RADLIFFE CROCKER.

Da" RADCLIFFE CROCKER commenced by giving a cordiawelcome to the new students, and gave them some adviceupon the way in which they should spend their time awa3

from the College and in the selection of their companionsIn advising them about their work, he began by showingthem how not to do it, by describing certain types ojstudents, whose methods did not lead to success, the typesselected being the " Casual student," the " Dilettante student,’and the "Over-diligent student." He then proceeded te

show how the student should do it, and impressed uponthem the necessity of being as practical and objective intheir work as possible, pointing out that if they neglectedtheir opportunities of learning the use of instruments ofdiagnosis while students, they could never learn it after-wards, however much they might try, and that thus theirstethoscope would become a mere symbol of their profession,like "a portable barber’s pole"; while, after all, the bestequipped student, when he leit the hospital, was not amedical man of experience, but a medical man capable ofprofiting by his experience. He also urged upon them thenecessity of thoroughness and accuracy in the examinationof their cases, as it was not so much how many cases theysaw, as how they saw them, pointing out that thus a largehospital might become a disadvantage to a student, unlesshe was careful not to hurry over his cases. He showed howUniversity College Hospital, for example, which was a hos-pital of moderate size, had, from making the best use oftheir materials and thoroughly training the student, turnedout men equal to any in the profession, and instanced,among those of the present day, Erichsen, Thompson, andMarshall among the surgeons, and Walshe, Jenner, RussellReynolds, and the late Wilson Fox among physicians, as aproof that it was quality, not quantity, that was essential.The lecturer then briefly alluded to the necessity of an

ILD. degree being accessible to the good average Londonstudent, from which he was at present deb: rred bv the highstandard and stringent regulations of the London University,and said that the teachers of London were determined thatsuch a degree should be ere long within the student’s reach.Passing on to the time when the student had got throughall his examinations, and taking up the case of those whosought to go into consulting practice, he showed them whata long and trying time must elapse before practice came, andurged them not to be led into the error of the day of adver-tising themselves directly or indirectly in order to obtainpractice by a direct appeal to the public sooner than theywould by addressing themselves to the profession at large,and to look rather to the general practitioner to send thempatients; he showed how the advertisers were the leasttrustworthy men in the profession, and that they for the mostpart belonged to two classes, ignorant or comparativelyignorant men, who yet made great pretence of know- I

ledge, and whom he denounced as quacks, althoughthey were in the profession, while in the other classwere men of ability who were in such haste to be richthat they could not wait until practice came through legiti-

, mate channels, and though they doubtless cured theirpatients eventually, they secured as much money out ofthem as possible. Further elaborating the subject, heclassified the advertising part of the profession on the prin-11 Touchstone used in the gradations of quarrelling, anddescribed humorously the Advertiser Churlish" as the manwho wrote works in which he made out everyone to beWrong but himself, professing to have made discoveries

which the blindness and narrow conservatism of the pro-fession prevented it seeing and adopting, and whenpatients had been previously treated, depreciated directly orindirectly their former adviser in order to exalt themselves.The Advertiser Valiant" was a man who paraded hisability to cure obstinate or incurable diseases, such as con-sumption, cancer, &c., and ascribed his success partly tobeing always ready to make the more serious diagnosiseven in comparatively mild forms of diseases, and thus hewas credited with curing phthisis, or whatever the diseasemight be, without really deserving it; further, even if hefailed, he was always having a succession of new patientsthrough his advertisements. The 11 Advertiser Quarrelsome

"

took the form of writing pamphlets against the abuse ofvarious drugs in the treatment of disease or against opera-tions in various surgical affections, and claimed to showhow he avoided all such dangerous methods, and yetcured his patients more quickly and safely. The last twowere, the Advertiser Direct" and the Advertiser Circum-stantial." Pointing out that very few went so far as toadvertise themselves directly, as they ran too much risk ofbeing expelled from the profession, he described the " Adver-tiser Circumstantial," who, while appearing to praise something else, was really putting himself forward. As the mostflagrant instances, he mentioned men who lent their aid inpuffing sundry trade articles, either directly, by writingtestimonials to the vendors, or indirectly, by allowingextracts from their works to be reprinted by the vendorsof drugs, foods, or hygienic articles, and sent round ascirculars, or left in public places. Another plan was towrite works known as "bread-and-butter books," of moreor less pretension, on common diseases, such as "gout," orsome fashionable new treatment, such as " massage," to givethe impression that they are authorities on the subject; andhe urged the public to be more ready to listen to the adviceof their family practitioner as to whom they should consult,rather than be led by these plausible writings, of whosemerits they were not competent judges to choose for them-

selves. He felt, however, that in the face of the supportthat the public gave to quack nostrums, systems, andunqualified pretenders outside the profession, they did notseem likely of themselves to discriminate as to who wereor were not the quacks within it. At the same time, hefeared that the profession were not as active as they mightbe in labelling these men as they deserved. He urged thatthey should refuse to meet them in consultation more thanthey did, and that they should shun their acquaintance; thatmen of repute should be more careful how they allowed theirnames to be on the consulting staff of special hospitals, oftenstarted by inferior men to serve their own ends; that medicalsocieties should not only exercise care in admitting theirmembers, which he acknowledged they did, but that whenmen advertised, and in other ways showed themselvesunworthy, the offending member should be summoned be-fore the Council, and, if necessary, expelled, and gave aninstance in which this had not been done in a flagrantoffender. Similarly, that licensing bodies should alwaysexercise to the full all the powers they possess to stop thosewho offended, even when the advertisements were notabsolutely direct.The lecturer concluded by warning those who sought to do

consulting practice that they must be content to wait sometime before they could make a reputation amongst theirmedical brethren, who could judge of the merits of theirwork in societies and other scientific meetings, from com-munications to medical journals and bona-fide works, whichwould lay a surer foundation for their reputation than thatwhich they might get from ephemeral popularity. Heexhorted them, one and all, not to let money-making betheir sole aim, nor to allow, as a French writer put it, "theirconscience to be a watch regulated by the clock of the parish,"but, in the words of Polonius to Laertes,-

" This above all-to thine own self be true ;And it must follow, as the night the day.Thou canst not then be false to any man."

ARMY MEDICAL SCHOOL.

THE winter session of the Army Medical School was

opened at Netley on Monday, the 3rd inst. The introductorylecture was delivered by Professor David Boyes Smith,M.D., F.R.C.P., who in his discourse gave a review of thevaluable work done in various departments of science by