"Hoc autem de quo nunc agimus id ipsum est quod utile appellatur."—Cicero.

Consultation. We are to have a consultation! What a sound is that! How many a heart has been set thumping by this one word. We doubt whether there be any in the English language that has more frequently disturbed the current it was intended to calm. But consultations must be. Already the carriage of a physician has arrived, a tremendous rap has been given at the door, the interesting visitor is already in the library.

Another rap, louder somewhat than the former, announces another physician, or a consulting surgeon. The general practitioner, taking advantage of his intimacy with the family, may have perhaps very sensibly walked in without knocking at all. They are now all assembled in the library, and, having remarked on a "Storm Scene" by Gaspar Poussin, which hangs over the fire-place, we leave them to the preliminaries of a consultation.

Presently they are introduced to the patient, on whom the knocking has already had some effect. A short pause, and they are again assembled in the library. In a few minutes the bell rings, and the father of a fine young woman is summoned to hear their decision. As he proceeds, he stealthily removes a straggling tear that, with all care, would get out of bounds, enters the library, and hears the result of the consultation. Neatly enveloped honoraria are presented to the consultants, the bell has rung, Thomas has shown the gentlemen to their respective vehicles, and and so ends the consultation.

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The father, a widower, returns to the drawing-room, and his second daughter says: "Well, papa, what do the doctors say of Emily?" "Well, my dear, they say that Emily is very ill; that she requires great care; that they cannot say positively, but hope she may ultimately do well. They entirely coincide with our friend Mr. Smith Jones as to the nature of the disease, and think his treatment of the case has been highly judicious. They say there are some points on which the case may turn, but of which they cannot speak positively to-day; but they hope to be able to do so when they meet again, which they are to do the day \'after to-morrow.\' They all seem to consider the nervous system very much affected. They say we must keep Emily very quiet. She is to have any light diet she desires, and to have some new medicine to-morrow. The cod-liver oil, they say, has done her all the good now that it is calculated to do, and she is this evening to take a composing draught." The family are silent, and so ends the consultation.

What! and are all consultations like that? No, reader, we hope not. Many a valuable life has, we believe, been saved or prolonged by consultation; and perhaps many more would be, if people would only think a little more before they act in such important matters.

But how is this to be, when men and women who do think will dive into all other branches of knowledge, more or less, and neglect all inquiry into laws, a general knowledge of which may easily be acquired, and of which ignorance is so frequently visited by no less punishment than the premature separation of our dearest ties, and the loss or impairment of that which is acknowledged to be the first of temporal blessings. There are many things in consultations, which require putting right, which do not depend on any one man, or on any one class. What are we to say to a man who admits the ability, and approves of the investigative power and practice of another, but who cannot call him in because he orders so little medicine? Or of the mode in which the public treat another, who, wishing to practise as a gentleman, and to be paid for his brains rather than his bottles, makes no charge for the latter; and yet who informed us that,249 having tried this for three years, he lost so many families by it, that if he had not relinquished the plan, he should have wanted bread for his own? Or who shall we blame, when one man, calling in another to a patient, finds that the other feels no scruple in repaying the prestige which he thus owes to his confiding brother by taking the patient from him the first opportunity; albeit that he occupies what should be, and, we trust, as the rule is, a higher walk in the profession.

We have seen so much feeling arising from this practice, and we hold it as so serious an error, that we regard it as tending more than any one thing whatever to injure the position and character of the consulting branches of the profession.

Again, how inconsiderate must be the adoption of that custom which first of all institutes an inquiry to ascertain whether there is any difference of opinion, and yet accompanies it with trammels, the tendency of which is to oblige men to appear to agree. When coincidence of opinion is alone safe, who can be expected to differ? The public have allowed lawyers to differ without that difference involving any reproach. They have also proverbially determined that "doctors do." Yet that which they consider as an almost necessary rule in the one case, in the other they are very prone to visit, in regard to some one of the dissentients, as a proof of professional inferiority. A great deal of mischief results from this state of things; it indefinitely increases the difficulty of obtaining a really honest and unreserved opinion, and leads to other consequences which tend to impair that mutual confidence between man and man, which should be the very life-blood of a fine profession.

We recollect a case, on the nature of which two surgeons were consulted; and when the patient—a young lady—had been withdrawn, the father requested to know if there were any objection to his being present at the conference. The surgeon to whom he seemed to address himself said, "None on my part;" to which the other seemed also to assent. When the consultation was over, the surgeon who had thus seemed to consent addressed the other, saying: "If ever we meet again, sir, our consultation must not be in the presence of the friends of the patient." This was said250 in a tone to which the other had not been accustomed; but, as a lady had just then enter............