Page:Introductory lecture delivered to the class of military surgery in the University of Edinburgh, May 1, 1855 (IA b21916469).pdf/10

9 character in one of the old novels, Zachary Candle, whose great merit consisted in his being a clever hand at a succedaneum.

Under the pressure of such sickness as that which has prevailed at Balaklava and at Scutari,

I should be little disposed to indulge young surgeons in exercising their fancy, or experimenting with a variety of drugs. The administration of medicine, however necessary it may be to alleviate pain, or to aid in the cure of disease, is but little calculated to ameliorate the air of a crowded hospital, or to promote that cleanliness which, in such circumstances, is, of all medicaments, the most indispensable. I am not given to homoeopathy, nor am I prepared to subscribe to the doctrine of the late Mr. Knight, the Inspector-General of hospitals at the time I entered the service, who said to a surgeon, whom he thought a little too fond of drugging, that "he would carry as much physic in his breeches pocket as would serve him and his regiment for six months; and that soldiers wanted nothing but tartar emetic, and a big stick." The value of the tartar emetic 1 am quite ready to admit; and as to the big stick, the cases which suggested its use have greatly diminished since those days. Never