Page:On the education of the people of India (IA oneducationofpeo00trevrich).pdf/41

Rh properly taken advantage of, we shall ere long be able to make a salutary impression on this most important part of the community.

While the general question of native education was debated in the committee, a distinct but deeply interesting branch of the subject underwent a similar examination elsewhere. The instruction of the natives in the medical art had hitherto been provided for as follows. The systems of Galen and Hippocrates, and of the Shasters, with the addition of a few scraps of European medical science, was taught in classes which had been attached for that purpose to the Arabic and Sanskrit colleges at Calcutta. There was also a separate institution at Calcutta, the object of which was to train up “native doctors,” or assistants to the European medical officers. There was only one teacher attached to this institution, and he delivered his lectures in Hindusthanee. The only medical books open to the pupils were a few short tracts which had been translated for their use into that language; the only dissection practised was that of the inferior animals. It is obvious that the knowledge communicated by such imperfect means could neither be complete nor practical.

Much public benefit had been derived in the