Page:KIdd 1841 Observations on medical reform.djvu/9

 doctors in medicine of Cambridge and Oxford were admissible as fellows of the College. Of the intention of such a preference there is no indication in the original statute of foundation, or in the subsequent confirmations of that statute; by which, in order to be qualified for a fellowship, it was simply requisite that the applicant should be of good morals, and a Doctor in Medicine of any university, English or foreign: and among the fellows in the earlier years of the College many were not merely graduates of foreign universities, but were, both by birth and extraction, themselves foreigners, as has been stated to have been the case with reference to many of the physicians of London antecedently to the foundation of the College.

In the year 1575 there were only one M.D. of Cambridge and one M.D. of Oxford in the College: but there were in the same year no less than five individuals in the College, making one-fourth of its then whole number, who were foreigners by birth as well as with reference to their degree of Doctor in Medicine. And even so late as the year 1610, a proof of the little favour then shewn to the English universities. Dr. Bonham of Cambridge, as has been already stated, was imprisoned by the College for practising in London without a license from the College.

When the custom of admitting none but Doctors in Medicine of Cambridge and Oxford to the fellowship had been established many years as a fixed rule, and the numerous body of the licentiates despaired of any voluntary