0"T' LAERT> "! - USP

12 ANCIENT TIMES.
sion to practise when the Government is careless and lax.
The instruction consisted in the teacher reading to the pupil
extracts from the medical writings, and making him repeat
them again, so often, that finally the student knew them by
heart. The delivery should be " in a loud and clear voice
and with distinct accentuation of the words which should
not be slurred over or rendered indistinct by a nasal tone."
The scholar must endeavour to lay hold of what is taught
him not only by the ear but by the understanding: otherwise
he " resembles an ass who bears a burden of sandalwood,
knowing only the weight, not the worth of his load."
(Chap. 4). The teacher is enjoined (Chap. 9) to instruct
the pupil in the carrying out of surgical operations, in the
application of ointments and generally in practical matters
for "without practical training' and merely by hearing
lectures and by the repetition of discourses, no one is fitly
prepared for medical practice." Particular surgical operations
were taught and practised.on fruits, for instance
melons ; puncturing was practised on bladders or leather
bottles filled with water, mud or clay; scarification, on
pieces of leather stretched out and with the hair on ; bloodletting
upon the vessels of dead animals or the stalk of a
water-lily; explorations with the probe,' on worm-eaten
wood, bamboo, reeds or dried gourds; extraction of teeth,
•on dead animals; the opening of abscesses, on a lump of wax
spread out on a piece of Salmali (wood of Bombax Malabaricum)
; the sewing up of wounds on thick garments or
the edges of two pieces of t'hin leather; the application of
bandages, on models of the human body prepared from wood
or clay; the application of caustics and cauteries on thin
slices of meat; the drawing-off of urine from the bladder or
the removal of matter from the pelvis by means of reeds
and an earthen vessel provided with a spout and filled with
water, or else a gourd. In India very high consideration was
given to surgery. When DHANVANTARI (Chap; 1) asked
his pupils which branch of the healing art he should ex
pound to them, they answered : 'teach us everything but