Fellow-commoners, every man of whom they "gated" after the milder fashion, confining them to the precincts of the college. At that time the Fellow-commoners had the privilege of bringing their horses through the courts and gardens, so every man took his beast, and rode with all the violence he could muster up and down the gardens and courts aforesaid, to the imminent danger of the necks of all passers, and not least of the Fellows, fat and well fed, and not over brisk in getting out of the way. The authorities were forced to remit the punishment, but they took away the privilege. Fines are a common punishment; a penny for missing morning chapel, and half-a-crown for running across the grass. The proctors, too, inflict six and eightpence on every one they catch after dark without his gown; we have seen a poor fellow who had just turned out of his room for a minute to fetch a book, mulcted in this way.

One cannot but remark, after noticing these scenes, upon the schoolboy character which predominates in all of them. The high qualities which, at the age of twenty-one, may be insinuated into the mind, but which can never be taught these perish altogether amid the baneful habits which the system engenders. If young men are to be treated like schoolboys, of course they will act like them; the misfortune is that, in so acting, they now have it in their power to inflict the most serious injury on themselves and others. There might be some excuse for the endless laws and regulations by which the undergraduate is hedged in on every side, if they answered their purpose; it might be said that, though mischievous in some respects, they were necessary to repress the still greater evils of vice and immorality. But we appeal to those who know anything of a Cambridge life, whether a single person is ever deterred from his object by the fear of a college punishment. We may safely affirm that in no instance do the laws and regulations give the slightest hindrance to the inclination-they only compel rashness to be fraudulent, and superadd deceit to folly.

During the weeks of the meetings at Newmarket, the undergraduates are obliged to show themselves in hall, by way of preventing any visits to the race-course. Now the business at

Newmarket is over at four o'clock, and the hall is not over till a quarter to five, so that, by a little hard riding, the thing may be easily done, and the punishment avoided; and a zest is given to the fault, which is often the cause of its being committed; so many are pleased at the idea of doing a fine thing. It is a fine thing, again, to appear at night without the gown, the compulsory wearing of which is another triviality; and the reason for insisting upon this one is, that the authorities may know the members of

VOL. XXXV. No. II.

K K

the university if they find them in forbidden places, just as if a man bent on attending any such place would regard the trifling fine inflicted on him for being gownless, while by his other conduct he was incurring the risk of the most grievous consequence. The evils of all this it is impossible to exaggerate-to vice is given the respectability of danger, and the excitement of a thing forbidden the true notion of honour is destroyed in the breastfraud and artifice introduced into the mind.

Would we, then, give the free rein to lust and sensuality? God forbid—but the thing is to be managed. General rules are of no use whatever; a set of men acquainted with the world— with the human heart-with the workings of nature-if such were to act as overseers over the pupils, every evil might be mitigated at least, for there are few in whose minds folly will not yield to the proper antidote; but this antidote is not to be found in a stringent order on a square piece of paper, posted on the college walls. Nothing, however, is to be expected while men bred up in old ideas-ignorant of all beyond their own walls -unacquainted with persuasion, with tact, with mankind,—are intrusted with the education of so important a class at so -important an age.

We may hereafter advert to another class of questions of a character more open and notorious, and such as are more easily within the reach of legislation. Those which we have discussed, as they are the less conspicuous, so they lie now entirely in the heart of the system, and are not the less important because made up of parts in themselves minute and inconsiderable. Nor can it be matter of wonder that we have found much to complain of when it is recollected that the institutions of the colleges were made for other times-that they themselves were founded for other men and other purposes. Rules well fitted for a school of theology but ill become the seminarian of the intelligence of the kingdom; statutes intended for the government of boys of twelve or fourteen-the common age of students a century ago-these can hardly be such as young men of two-and-twenty can be expected to submit to. On the whole, considering how few concessions have been made to time and circumstance, it is wonderful that the good is as great as it is; as to the evil, it is impossible to calculate it-it is impossible to say how many characters have been ruined, how many false notions have been instilled into the breast, how many minds fitted for better things have been reduced to weakness and indiscretion, or seduced to vice, turpitude, and folly. Nor will many of the evils be remedied as long as the government of the colleges is confided to those who have spent their lives within their walls; men originally

distinguished for nothing but an accurate knowledge of the mathematical ideas of others, the refuse of wranglers, who have been too lazy or too stupid to enter on the more active and exciting business of the world. There is a moral unfitness supposed in their choice of life, and this unfitness is increased tenfold by the habits and ideas acquired in their seclusion, and by the want of that necessary intelligence which their seclusion prevents them from acquiring. The only qualification at present required for the man who is to direct the characters and perhaps fix the fates of the youth of our country is, that he should have been one of the first twenty wranglers twenty years ago, and should never have quitted his college since. N.

ART. VIII.-1. Observations on Medical Reform. By J. Kidd. Churchill.

2. A Letter to the Members for Edinburgh. By Sir Charles Bell. 3. The Second Annual Oration on Medical Reform. By William Farr, Esq. (Lancet, 19th Oct., 1839.)

4. Parliamentary Evidence on Medical Instruction. 1834.

IT

T was long ago remarked by Rousseau, that the vain and false declamations of healthy persons against the utility of the science of medicine were unworthy of notice: yet in the time of that distinguished writer, very exact data did not exist for proving the value of the healing art. A careful study of vital statistics now demonstrates that Nature is not guided in her infliction of the stroke of death by freaks, as the apparent irregularities in the duration of life have been designated, but that the laws of vitality are fixed and certain.

The average annual mortality of England and Wales, during the eighteen years 1813-30, amounted to 1 in 47.2; but by the rate of mortality determined, 60 years ago, by Dr Heysham's observations, it would have been considerably greater, or 1 in 38.5. When we attend to the period of life at which this change has taken place since these observations were made, we find that the improvement has been in a diminution of deaths among children under the age of five years. The rate of mortality in 1813-30 was equal to 4.98 out of every 100 children living

* See also note by the Editor (page 495), on the present state of the question of Medical Reform.

under the age of five years; while, by Dr Heysham's table, it was 8 23 per cent. Here we have, therefore, the astounding fact that now little more than one-half of the children die under the age of five years that died under that age in the last century, and that the value of life has doubled during this period of helplessness. How are we to account for such a remarkable fact? Are mothers more affectionate to their children than they used to be? or has the constitution of man improved? The most sceptical must admit that the improvements in the science of medicine-that the application of the vast discoveries in physical science to the proper regulation of the exercise and diet of the human frame, must have had their share in staying the work of death.

Another favourable light in which we may view medicine, is in its capability of discriminating the causes of diseases, and pointing out the means by which noxious influences may be removed and prevented from affecting the human frame. A pestilent fever, too familiar to the community under the name of typhus, annually numbers its thousands of victims; but the minute and accurate investigations of physicians have shown that two distinct diseases have been confounded under this title. One of these is characterized by extensive disease of the glands of the intestines, and is, perhaps, the true typhus; while the other-a fever which pervades the whole system, is not confined to one part of the frame in preference to another-and predominates, to a great extent, in manufacturing towns. In Glasgow it is fearfully destructive, and its influence appears to be extending; 957 persons die annually of fever in that city. The medical profession have given it as the unequivocal result of their researches, that this disease is the product of bad ventilation, defective drainage, and filth, wretchedness, and misery; and that its ravages can only be prevented by the removal of the causes which constitute its soil-its food-its existence.

By another disease, the small-pox, a large portion of the flower of England is still sacrificed. Five children die daily in London of this disease, according to Mr Farr. During the years 1838-39, upwards of thirty thousand persons have fallen victims to smallpox in England and Wales; and yet the science of medicine has afforded a means by which, in one week, this awful mortality might terminate. Vaccination, the scientific and beneficent discovery of Dr Jenner, if extensively applied, would at once cause this blot on the hygienic regulations of this country to be wiped

away.

These facts demonstrate that medicine can assist in protracting the average length of life. It cannot prevent mortals from

dying, but it can assuredly render its aid in warding off the stroke to a future day, and thus increase the average duration of man's existence on the earth. According to Baron Dupin, before the French revolution, from 1770 to 1790, there died, on a yearly average, the thirtieth part of the population, while at present the annual mortality only amounts to the fortieth part, showing an increase of ten years upon the average length of the life of Frenchmen. In no country in Europe has greater advance been made in the science of medicine than in France.

We need not, however, multiply examples of the efficacy of medicine in saving thousands of lives annually, or dwell upon the certainty that its benefits may be pushed still further, and to a degree quite incalculable.

The practical question for consideration is how the public are to be protected, in a matter of such serious importance, from mere charlatanism, and what security is given that the host of doctors who annually take up their residence in different parts of the country are fully qualified to practise the healing art? If no such security is given by the present laws, is it possible to introduce a system of legislation which shall secure the services of a number of competent, well-educated practitioners, and suppress, as much as possible, empiricism in every form? We will devote a few words to this subject, and first take a brief survey of the present state of the profession in this country, and of the defective condition of the medical corporations.

The medical profession is divided into four departments, between the first two of which, physicians and surgeons, a most absurd line of demarcation is drawn, as if they involved studies incompatible with each other, instead of essentially connected. A physician in England, for example, is not required to know anything of surgery, and a surgeon is not examined on the treatment of diseases which affect the body internally; but by a strange anomaly the surgeon-apothecary (the third division), who is supposed to be supplied with a cheaper education, not only is examined on medicine and surgery, but also on midwifery; so that, according to this system, the lesser includes the greater, but the greater does not include the lesser. The fourth department is a very important one on the continent, but in this country, on a level with an ordinary trade—we allude to the dealer in chemicals and medicines; the chemist and druggist of England, the apothecary of Scotland, Ireland, and Germany, and the pharmacien of France.

We will notice these artificial divisions of the medical profession separately, and point out some of the defects of each.

PHYSICIANS.-Medicine among savage nations is a part of