Genre:

Letter, Spoof

Subjects:

Medical Practitioners, Surgery, Class

    Addressed to the statesman Charles L W Sibthorp, asks why assistant surgeons in the Royal Navy, 'adult members of a liberal profession', are restricted 'to the berth of sea-schoolboys'. Disputes the claim put forward by a Lord of the Admiralty, James W D Dundas, that the reason for this arrangement was due to lack of space, and condemns the claim of another Admiralty lord, Maurice F F Berkeley, that, owing to inferior birth and education, an assistant-surgeon should not mix with senior officers lest he damage 'the discipline of the service'.