performed operations on the dead body as often as opportunity permitted the best means to the end ? Are we not, every one of us, before completing the period of nine years' service, entrusted with independent medical charges of responsibility ? Is it not of more importance to Government to know how we work than how we read ? Are we not systematically inspected by an administrative medical officer yearly ? Does the mode in which
we
perform
our
work not evidence our continued
"
inter-
and
diligence in our calling ?" Skill and experience are not to be tested by two or three questions evolved at haphazard from the weary brain of an overworked Calcutta professor. Our work is really a stronger witness of what we are than these examinations, and why not accept the better and surer evidence and dispense with the weaker and less reliable ? est
Well put, friend, but does every independent medical charge? native cavalry corps for example?enable its holder to light before Government, so that there need be no hesitation in promoting him ? Can you, on the strength of a sick list of half a dozen men afflicted with boils and bruises, appeal to your established professional reputation ? A. reputation for good fellowship, rough-riding, and pig-sticking does not entitle you to demand advancement in a medical service. Moreover, you may be placed where the eagle eye of a Deputy Surgeon-General does not penetrate for years, and, after all Deputy Surgeons General are but men. You may have failed to salute hiin properly on the mall, cut his wife or jilted his daughter, and your professional merits are viewed, in consequence, through a clouded medium. Nothing like a uniform test?an impersonal test, without feelings or prejudices?a test affecting all men alike; and, after all, work is but your duty; if you don't work you are got rid of. Something more is expected of you than mere work?culture, my young friend, culture. Approved work gives a claim to preferment and selection for better appointments; but departmental promotion ought to depend on professional knowledge and merit ascertained by systematic testing. If the examination is slight or unequal, that is not the fault of the system but of its application, and, not having been as yet put to trial, you have no right to judge too positively of its nature and value. But, returneth he, allowing that, in oases such as you adduce, a promotion examination is of some use, why should men who have had the opportunity of showing what is in them, and have made a reputation?men who are professors in msdical schools and authors?men who have passed the fellowship examination in London?be subjected to the annoyance and degradation of questions, &c., &c. ? Why should Government not accept the known eminence in their profession of such men as a sufficient qualification for promotion? Just think of a professor, from whom gaping and admiring students imbibe knowledge and wisdom, and who is to them the embodiment of science and skill, being examined like one of themselves; and, that of
place
?fjc fintuflit JJfletucal ?>njcttc, AUGUST 2, 1875.
DEPARTM15NTAL EXAMINATIONS. Rules have recently been issued by the Government of India the examination which medical officers of the Indian
regarding service
are
rank of
required
to
undergo previous
Surgeon-Major. Though
to
these rules
promotion
to
the
very similar to those obtaining in the sister service, their publication has excited very considerable interest and much discussion among those medical officers?now vice since
jot
down
a
a
are
have
large body?who
joined
the
ser-
1865, and who are affected by them. "NVe shall here few observations on the points which we have heard
canvassed, and shall put them in the form of replies to
an
imaginary objector. Why have such an examination we
at all ? urges our friend. Have not been examined and re-examined and examined again
before we entered the service and after
have gone
through sufficiently Netley, tested thereby ? True, we answer, you have been fully and repeatedly examin. ed, and your knowledge of medicine and the sciences on which and has our theoretical
it rests has been found sufficient to
but medicine is
a
we
knowledge
qualify
not been
you for the service ; and India is a
rapidly progressive science,
arrived in this country, you very indolent clime ; and, since you to evaporate and old all knowledge have your may permitted in its stead. Besides, why should you be exempted departmental examinations ? Other services have them, and the subordinate grades of your own service have them; and would it be fitting, think you, that, while Apothecaries, Assistant Surgeons, and "Native Doctors" of all kinds are tested once and again, you should float in a lordly manner over your service, without evidence being once taken of your continued interest and diligence in your calling ? But, rejoins our surgeon, granting that it i3 necessary for Government, through the agency of its medical administrative department, to satisfy itself before p omoting us that we have
put
no new
from
eating the bread of idleness since we entered the service, propounding and answering of a few written questions of theoretical kind, the preparation of a medico-topographico-
not been is the a
statistical report, and the submission of a certificate that
we
have
a
his
Oh horror ! Plucked ! ! A terrible picture truly, we respond, but a division of the service into examinables and non-examinables would be a most invidious process, and are not our swell men conceited enough pray, would you draw the line ? And is it not within the bounds of possibility that your talented and accomplished professor of chemistry?an author and discoverer too?
already ? Where,
might
be innocent of
hernia
or
presystolic
such
plain subjects as strangulated placenta praevia ?
murmurs or
THE INDIAN MEDICAL GAZETTE.
210
Quite so, quoth he, and that leads me to a point that I was just about to urge. Many men of the Indian service take up special positions, scientific, professional, or even non-professional, become botanists, foresters, politicals, and what not. They have no desire or intention of returning to the regular line, and government finds it convenient and advantageous to retain them in their special appointments or employments. Is it not hard on them and very absurd to compel them to waste their brains on midwifery or the multifarious and mysterious maladies of human babies?subjects which possess for them neither interest ?
nor use
You
forget,
we
argue, that you
scrvice, that you belong to
a
deliberately
entered
a
medical
medical service, that in doing
enjoying the privileges and advantages of that are supposed to be fitted and available for purely " professional work. Government may find it convenient and advantageous," as you put it, to utilize your special knowledge in botany, zoology, and what not, but it may also find it convenient and advantageous," in the event of war or pestilence, to use you for the purpose for which you joined, and remain in, the service, and even while using you for such special Yunan or tlio Laccapurposes, and sending you to Yarkand or dive Islands in the capacity of naturalist, it may reasonably expect you, in addition, to render such professional services as may be required by an expedition, whose numbers are necessarily limited. To this Surgeon X.?"Well, waiving these special arguments, I take up broader ground. Many of us are so fully employed that we have no time to mug up for examinations, and, besides, is it wise to impose on us, in the midst of practical work in which we are gradually losing the baneful habit of cramming our heads with ephemeral information, and are slowly, but surely, assimilating true knowledge and acquiring solid experience and valuable skill, the necessity of resorting again to the process of stuffing ourselves like capons or turkeys with material whioh we neither devour naturally nor digest normally for the purpose of being feasted on by some ravenous gorgons of examiners ? Softly, softly, we advance, thero is no need whatever to derange your intellectual digestion or sacrifice yourself in the awful manner which your elegant simile implies. The examinaso
and
service you
"
tion will doubtless bo so devised and conducted
that you will
l>e enabled to
display the knowledge that continuous thought and study during the whole course of your service have enabled you to amass, and not the crude concoction of sweets and spices with which mortem
temporary intellectual death and a resort to poststuffing or cramming have filled your precious cranium? a
pardon And, here,
never,
us, too full at its best. our
rambling dialogue has brought
of the whole matter.
The value and
success
us
to the
pith
of this examina-
depend entirely on the manner in which it is conducted. hope that it will be conducted reasonably, practically, and sensibly, and, in that hope, we should certainly recommend surgeons not to cram for it, but to hold it in view from the very first and keep themselves habitually posted up in all that is going on in medicine, surgery, midwifery and hygiene. Properly managed, this examination should be of real service, and, in place of creating irritation, it should weld the medical service together in one brotherhood of men working together to retain and improve their knowledge of that profession which ought to
tion will Let
us
be at once their
business,
their pastime, aud their pride.
[August
2, 1875.
we
perform
our
work not evidence our continued
"
inter-
and
diligence in our calling ?" Skill and experience are not to be tested by two or three questions evolved at haphazard from the weary brain of an overworked Calcutta professor. Our work is really a stronger witness of what we are than these examinations, and why not accept the better and surer evidence and dispense with the weaker and less reliable ? est
Well put, friend, but does every independent medical charge? native cavalry corps for example?enable its holder to light before Government, so that there need be no hesitation in promoting him ? Can you, on the strength of a sick list of half a dozen men afflicted with boils and bruises, appeal to your established professional reputation ? A. reputation for good fellowship, rough-riding, and pig-sticking does not entitle you to demand advancement in a medical service. Moreover, you may be placed where the eagle eye of a Deputy Surgeon-General does not penetrate for years, and, after all Deputy Surgeons General are but men. You may have failed to salute hiin properly on the mall, cut his wife or jilted his daughter, and your professional merits are viewed, in consequence, through a clouded medium. Nothing like a uniform test?an impersonal test, without feelings or prejudices?a test affecting all men alike; and, after all, work is but your duty; if you don't work you are got rid of. Something more is expected of you than mere work?culture, my young friend, culture. Approved work gives a claim to preferment and selection for better appointments; but departmental promotion ought to depend on professional knowledge and merit ascertained by systematic testing. If the examination is slight or unequal, that is not the fault of the system but of its application, and, not having been as yet put to trial, you have no right to judge too positively of its nature and value. But, returneth he, allowing that, in oases such as you adduce, a promotion examination is of some use, why should men who have had the opportunity of showing what is in them, and have made a reputation?men who are professors in msdical schools and authors?men who have passed the fellowship examination in London?be subjected to the annoyance and degradation of questions, &c., &c. ? Why should Government not accept the known eminence in their profession of such men as a sufficient qualification for promotion? Just think of a professor, from whom gaping and admiring students imbibe knowledge and wisdom, and who is to them the embodiment of science and skill, being examined like one of themselves; and, that of
place
?fjc fintuflit JJfletucal ?>njcttc, AUGUST 2, 1875.
DEPARTM15NTAL EXAMINATIONS. Rules have recently been issued by the Government of India the examination which medical officers of the Indian
regarding service
are
rank of
required
to
undergo previous
Surgeon-Major. Though
to
these rules
promotion
to
the
very similar to those obtaining in the sister service, their publication has excited very considerable interest and much discussion among those medical officers?now vice since
jot
down
a
a
are
have
large body?who
joined
the
ser-
1865, and who are affected by them. "NVe shall here few observations on the points which we have heard
canvassed, and shall put them in the form of replies to
an
imaginary objector. Why have such an examination we
at all ? urges our friend. Have not been examined and re-examined and examined again
before we entered the service and after
have gone
through sufficiently Netley, tested thereby ? True, we answer, you have been fully and repeatedly examin. ed, and your knowledge of medicine and the sciences on which and has our theoretical
it rests has been found sufficient to
but medicine is
a
we
knowledge
qualify
not been
you for the service ; and India is a
rapidly progressive science,
arrived in this country, you very indolent clime ; and, since you to evaporate and old all knowledge have your may permitted in its stead. Besides, why should you be exempted departmental examinations ? Other services have them, and the subordinate grades of your own service have them; and would it be fitting, think you, that, while Apothecaries, Assistant Surgeons, and "Native Doctors" of all kinds are tested once and again, you should float in a lordly manner over your service, without evidence being once taken of your continued interest and diligence in your calling ? But, rejoins our surgeon, granting that it i3 necessary for Government, through the agency of its medical administrative department, to satisfy itself before p omoting us that we have
put
no new
from
eating the bread of idleness since we entered the service, propounding and answering of a few written questions of theoretical kind, the preparation of a medico-topographico-
not been is the a
statistical report, and the submission of a certificate that
we
have
a
his
Oh horror ! Plucked ! ! A terrible picture truly, we respond, but a division of the service into examinables and non-examinables would be a most invidious process, and are not our swell men conceited enough pray, would you draw the line ? And is it not within the bounds of possibility that your talented and accomplished professor of chemistry?an author and discoverer too?
already ? Where,
might
be innocent of
hernia
or
presystolic
such
plain subjects as strangulated placenta praevia ?
murmurs or
THE INDIAN MEDICAL GAZETTE.
210
Quite so, quoth he, and that leads me to a point that I was just about to urge. Many men of the Indian service take up special positions, scientific, professional, or even non-professional, become botanists, foresters, politicals, and what not. They have no desire or intention of returning to the regular line, and government finds it convenient and advantageous to retain them in their special appointments or employments. Is it not hard on them and very absurd to compel them to waste their brains on midwifery or the multifarious and mysterious maladies of human babies?subjects which possess for them neither interest ?
nor use
You
forget,
we
argue, that you
scrvice, that you belong to
a
deliberately
entered
a
medical
medical service, that in doing
enjoying the privileges and advantages of that are supposed to be fitted and available for purely " professional work. Government may find it convenient and advantageous," as you put it, to utilize your special knowledge in botany, zoology, and what not, but it may also find it convenient and advantageous," in the event of war or pestilence, to use you for the purpose for which you joined, and remain in, the service, and even while using you for such special Yunan or tlio Laccapurposes, and sending you to Yarkand or dive Islands in the capacity of naturalist, it may reasonably expect you, in addition, to render such professional services as may be required by an expedition, whose numbers are necessarily limited. To this Surgeon X.?"Well, waiving these special arguments, I take up broader ground. Many of us are so fully employed that we have no time to mug up for examinations, and, besides, is it wise to impose on us, in the midst of practical work in which we are gradually losing the baneful habit of cramming our heads with ephemeral information, and are slowly, but surely, assimilating true knowledge and acquiring solid experience and valuable skill, the necessity of resorting again to the process of stuffing ourselves like capons or turkeys with material whioh we neither devour naturally nor digest normally for the purpose of being feasted on by some ravenous gorgons of examiners ? Softly, softly, we advance, thero is no need whatever to derange your intellectual digestion or sacrifice yourself in the awful manner which your elegant simile implies. The examinaso
and
service you
"
tion will doubtless bo so devised and conducted
that you will
l>e enabled to
display the knowledge that continuous thought and study during the whole course of your service have enabled you to amass, and not the crude concoction of sweets and spices with which mortem
temporary intellectual death and a resort to poststuffing or cramming have filled your precious cranium? a
pardon And, here,
never,
us, too full at its best. our
rambling dialogue has brought
of the whole matter.
The value and
success
us
to the
pith
of this examina-
depend entirely on the manner in which it is conducted. hope that it will be conducted reasonably, practically, and sensibly, and, in that hope, we should certainly recommend surgeons not to cram for it, but to hold it in view from the very first and keep themselves habitually posted up in all that is going on in medicine, surgery, midwifery and hygiene. Properly managed, this examination should be of real service, and, in place of creating irritation, it should weld the medical service together in one brotherhood of men working together to retain and improve their knowledge of that profession which ought to
tion will Let
us
be at once their
business,
their pastime, aud their pride.
[August
2, 1875.
