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day a man who was dissecting felt his arm suddenly twitched by somebody passing his table, and instantly exlaimed, "Sam, Sam, Sam, Don't Pull My Arm!' and our ingenious friend who was sitting near presently burst out laughing, for he found the first letters of the words correspond to a certain extent with the initials of the branches of the femoral artery-the Superficial epigastric, the Superficial circumflex iliac, the Superficial external pudic, the Deep external Pudic, the Muscular, and the Anastomotic!

Here are some more instances of a memoria technica being useful. In the jaws the inner side of the alveolar processes is thinner, the outer stouter; the pupil dilates for distant, but contracts for close objects. Of the interosseous muscles, the dorsal cause the digits to diverge from the middle line, the palmar and plantar to approach it.

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Is it surprising that four years' incessant cram of this sort on such numerous subjects makes even the most conscientious students very tired of taking notes and "grinding them up "?

No wonder we are thin and good-for-nothing at the end of each session. It is needless to hint dissipation as the cause of our miserable plight, when we have all this cramming in addition to dissection and hospital atmosphere, with insufficient exercise. No wonder we are indeed inexpressibly thankful when our last examination is over.

When a student has "passed," he should go the round of the medical schools on the Continent, if he can afford the time and money. We have not been to see them yet, so we can tell our readers nothing about

them; we must, therefore, content ourselves with referring inquirers to Dr William Rutherford's interesting article on the subject in the Edinburgh Medical Journal' for October 1865, p. 341-347.*

* Should this little book be so favourably received that another edition is demanded, we hope by that time to have had experience enough of the Edinburgh and Dublin Medical Schools to give in a new chapter a comparative sketch of the students in the three capitals.

CHAPTER XII.

THE UNIVERSITY OF LONDON.

Proposed amalgamation of the Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons with the University of London, and why—Alternative till this can be effected, in order to prevent "Hossing"What a "doctor" should be-Difference between University College and the University of London-Origin of both explained "Stinkomalee"-The 'Anti-Jacobin'—Ingoldsby's parody-Origin of King's College-Stormy debates before obtaining the charter for the University—What it still wants-Parting words.

WE said it was proposed to amalgamate the present Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons with the University of London, so as to have only one medical examining board in the metropolis. It would take years to carry out this scheme, but whenever it is effected it will be a great improvement, for it is a nuisance to read surgery for the College of Surgeons alongside of organic chemistry for the University.

We must explain how this occurs: A man comes up to town entirely ignorant of the regulations, so he is not aware till he is crowded with work that before entering his hospital he should have passed the matriculation examination; this is rather stiff, so he cannot get through it till the end of his first year, but must be content with passing, instead, the easy preliminary

examinations of the Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons. At the end of his second year he ought to pass another University examination called the "preliminary scientific "--but he has now to go up for his intermediate examinations in materia medica, anatomy, &c., at the Colleges. He cannot read for all three at once unless he is a very strong or a very clever man, so he passes the intermediate examinations, which are the easiest, and leaves the " preliminary scientific” till his third year. In his fourth year he has his final examinations in medicine, surgery, etc., at the Colleges, with the "1st M.B." at the University; and it is very distracting to try to read medicine and surgery, etc., for the former, by the side of anatomy, physiology, and organic chemistry for the latter.

It will be objected, "Oh, but he knows his anatomy already!" Yes, enough for the Colleges, but not for the University; and in proportion, the other subjects are more difficult. For instance, at the Colleges you may be asked, "What structures pass through the large hole in the occipital bone?" You may reply quite correctly, "The spinal cord, its vessels and membranes, the vertebral arteries, and the spinal accessory nerves,' "but that is a very short answer. This is the sort of question you will have at the University, “In the dried skull, the cheek-bone and upper jaw-bone being removed, describe all that can be seen." This would take a very long time to answer, for books do not help; you would know nothing about it unless you had gone over it carefully by yourself with a skull properly mounted.

Therefore the advantage of having but one examining board is obvious, and all agree that the University

of London would be the best. Of course there must be different grades of doctors as there are of lawyers, and a class of men for country practice might be easily provided by establishing the Oxford and Cambridge differences between honour-men and pass-men; the former for greater distinction we would call "Bachelors," and the latter "Licentiates," of medicine or surgery as the case might be.

There are already "licentiates of medicine" at Cambridge, but that title is not a degree, only a licence supplementary to the M.D. or M.B.; still we think "L.M." and "L.S." might be made the lowest degrees, for it seems to us that universities alone should pretend to give qualifying diplomas to such scientific men as medical practitioners of the present day.

We would reserve the highest degrees, "Doctor of Medicine" and "Doctor of Surgery," for those who intended to be pure physicians or pure surgeons; medical and surgical doctors would then be as few in number as legal and theological doctors, which would be a far better plan than the prevailing custom of dubbing all disciples of Esculapius doctors, merely because they practise the healing art.

It would be only fair to hand over the monopoly of conferring medical diplomas to the University of London, as, in spite of Mr Gathorne Hardy's assertions in the House of Commons, it has done an immense deal to raise the general education of the country, for between three and four hundred students matriculate in it every year, though the matriculation examination is as difficult as the "little-go," or "previous examination" at Cambridge.

It is stiffer than the Oxford and Cambridge middle

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