The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1887.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 26, 1 February 1887, Page 2

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1887.

For tha came that lacks aaiist-iscr, For the future in the dist&r.re, And the good that we can do.

Quite recently the University College Council have been attempting to inaugurate a Medical School in connection with the college. As a step in this direction they applied to the Hospital Board for leave to erect a dissecting room attached to the mortuary. Their zeal has been rudely rebuked. At the Council meeting on Friday there was laid upon the table a letter from the Hospital Board, intimating that the Board could not see its way to grant the Council's request. Their answer was fortified by tho opinion of ProfessorCoughtrey, a gentleman residing in Dunedin. Influenced, we presume, by the recent heat,

members of the Hospital Board betook

themselves to a colder climate for reasons that might justify their refusal. Well " it's a far cry to Cupar," and almost as far to Dunedin. Dr. (Jough-

trey may be a very able man, but we have Dr. Mackellar's authority for stat-

mg that he is not now Professor, and that for several j'ears he has not been connected with the Dunedin Medical Board. This in fact in itself somewhat discounts thevalue of his advice. Moreover the conditions of Dunedin and Auckland seem to be somewhat different, inasmuch as in Auck-

land the Hospital possesses a suitable building with ample grounds about it, whilst the College is here, there, and everywhere, or nowhere, without any proper buildings of its own, whereas in Dunedin the University is wealthy and properly housed whilst the Hospital seems to be the

reverse. Under these circumstances one does not quite see the analogy between

the two places, er why Dr. Coughtrey's opinion should be of such value, or why the medical men of Auckland should have been passed over to consult a medical practitioner in a southern city,

Dr. Mackellar directly traverses the whole statement. We, of course, do not write as experts on this question, but nevertheless it does seem to us that the effort made by tho University Coupcil to establish a medical school was at any rate deserving of support. Isolated as we are in this colony we should endeavour as far as may bo to render ourselves self-supporting and independent. We have not the older and the grander foundations of other countries for our medical students, to

attend. Is it not, therefore, all the more necessary that we should start,— though it may be at first, in a small way—institutions of our own, wherein may bu taught if only the alphabet of anatomy. Once start them and we doubt not that in due time they will develop and increase. At present one of the gravest questions of the colony is what to do with our boys. The field is sadly small — the opportunities grievously circumscribed. They may, it is true, become lawyers ; but they cannot all be such, or Heaven help the colony as well as them. They may become parsons ; a consummation, for their own sakes perhaps as much to be deplored. They may ba clerks and shopmen, tied down to respectability with nothing to support it. T.iey may go into the bush. To succeed there needs capital, and besides, our present system of education renders a youth disinclined to the hardships of a bush life and unfitted for it. Surely

it is of the greatest importance to initiate technical schools, as wo may say—for such is a Medical School— bringing to our doors new professions upon which our boys may cuter. Than this nothing is more likely to attract a better class of immigrant or settler. How can we expect that meu with families will throw in tlmir lot with New Zealand if they fool that by doing so the}' arc depriving their sons of tho professional openings and advantages to be found in other lands 1

It is not enough that we possess a University College with three or four Professors— that is all very well as far as it goes, but it does not go very far —it is merely tho entrance, as it wore. Behind the institution for the production of the B.A. and tho M.A. we want other institutions enabling our youth to supplement their merely literary training by such as fits them for professional work. Other colonies feel the difficulty, and face it. Dunedin, from which the advice conies to Auckland to leave the work alone, has established a Medical School for its own students. Then why should not we 1 Arc n« so enervated by the relaxing nature of our climate that we can only sit still with flaccid faces and limp, rcsourceless hands 1 If so the sooner we shut up shop and betake ourselves to Dunedin the better. We think the better plan, however, is to ship our Hospital Board there, leaving the people of Auckland to manage their own institutions in their own way for the advancement of our city. AYe sineovoly hope that tho question will not be allowed to drop, and that public opinion may vigorously support the University Council in their praiseworthy efforts, until we have in our midst a recognised and sufficient Medical School.