Genre:

Short Fiction, Satire, Serial

Subjects:

Medical Practitioners, Medical Treatment, Surgery, Education, Dissection, Anatomy, Pharmaceuticals, Class

    Describes revelries at Mr Rapp's farewell feast. The lecture-room skeleton was 'placed in a classical attitude' in the banqueting room, and the base of its skull used as a 'tobacco-box, proving that medical students, in their most idle moments, never lose sight of their studies'. Notes that the 'dissections' of the meat were 'speedily carved into anatomical preparations'. One guest, Mr Mahhug, sings a song entitled 'An Assistant wanted'. The song requests a 'gentleman' for a 'country practitioner highly genteel / With a union of paupers to physic and heal'. He asks for somebody who has a wide range of medical skills including the ability to 'bleed with precision, ne'er missing a vein' and to 'draw double teeth without fracture or pain'. He must know the 'Pharmacopoeia by heart', 'ne'er seem reluctant—when sent for—to go', and 'come in the parlour to dinner and tea', but return to his surgery when the meal's over. He must also be 'well dress'd', be able to 'walk like a postman', always be 'making a draught, mixture, or pill', and be able to 'sleep in a garret, small, dreary, and chill'.(155)