The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1859-02-07

Academy VI Medicine.
We of the metropolis must always have a
topic. Sometimes it is the last prima donna and
the "tbree hungry Frenchmen !" sometimes it is
the freshest murder, though they are rather too
common sometimes the Broadway Railway
always the awful tax bills; frequently the dirty
streets. AS a general thing. however, we are
singularly Indifferent to the matters that concern
US most. We talk about them for o day or two,
and then something new comes up, and we
plunge into that with the ardor of schoolboy
breaking his first pocket money. But the last
topic-to wit il the ridiculous exhibition of the
doctors at the Academy of Medicine: in their
famous probang controversy. The case was a
very simple one, aud presented no novel points;
and yet the consolidated and condensed medical
and surgical wisdom Of the country was brought
to bear upon it for no result whatever. "Nihl fit"
should be endorsed over the portals of that
Academy.
This glorious result was not reached without
considerable difficulty. The mountain laoored
awfnlly over the mouse before parsurition and
the gentle public watched with straining eyes
and parted lips for the happy ending
of the savants' labors. Did the man die
from the improper use of caustics?-or if not,
what did be die Of? That is the question
which everybody, from the Fifth avenue down
to the Five Points, is waiting to hear answered.
Flora McFlimsey here takes common ground
with Bridget O'Fiannagan. The throat of the
fashionable belle, although encirclcd by sable
or nesting in Valenciennes, is not more safe
| from the sponge-armed probang and the awful
caustic than the trachea Of the laundress. Disa-
greeabie as it may seem, the legs, arms, brain,
larynx and physical conformation generally are
precisely the same with Flora as they are with
| Bridget. So also with the sterner sex, who arc
| oftener more afraid of doctor than the ladies'
So it will be seen that everybody this side of
Greenwood was more or less interested in the
probang war, and this interest has been height
ened to pitch of intense excitement by the alb
surd proceedings in the Academy The topic
has swallowed nearly all the minor questions of
the day, and the gossips have not had such
grand festival since Barnum brought over Jenny
| Lind.
| 1t is indeed curious case. Here we find the
Academy Of Medicine, the Pierian spring from
which flows all the medical lore of the coun-
try, positively drained dry by the simplest case in
the world All at once it is found that these great
| doctors, whose names are never quoted without
certain degree of ave. absolutely know nothing.
| DR.. Beales has achieved miracle greater than
Barnum or any other Snowman in the world.
Van Amburgh trained tigers and lions till they
were as docile as dogs. Barnum made monde
script out of the parts Of several animals, and
called it woolly horse; he manufactured mer-
maid of the most approved pattern; he tanned
the Swedish Nightingale, and carried her about
in his pocket, and in the Happy Family he
proved to q demonstration that all animals, ex-
cept men and women, may live together without
quarrelliDg. Those were fine things, and made
Barnum's reputation, such as it is; but he never
could have equaled Beales. Through the efforts
of that practitioner the gravest professors of the
weightiest scientific body in America have been
shorn in one debate, of every vestige of public
| respect and confidence. A surgeon whose name
is honored at home and abroad; an anatomist
| who is compared to Hunter and an operator with
a museum full of trophies of brilliant successes
this man comes to the Academy and compromises
his reputation of fifty years standing by giving
upon one occasion direct contradiction of his
words upon another. OF course, the others are
| equally absurd, or more 80. At one moment the
Fellows were earnest, grave, respectable and
scientifically mysterious pundits. Doctor Beales
comes in with Pandoras box in the shape of the
memoranda in the Whitney case, and 10! the
Happy Family is snarling, quarrelling, fighting
and backbiting just like ordinary men or mem
bers Of Congress. All the punctilio, the gravity,
the decorum, the pomp, the dignity, the owl-like
stare, the Burleighan shake of the empty head,
the awful contemplation of the gold headed cane,
always pointing to the cemetery-all these, the
stock in trade of the Doctor Buncombes of all
days since Hippocrates, were swept away in
moment The old school doctors were glad to
have an opportunity to show up the men of
science whose Office practice cuts into the regular
business and in so doing, if they proved that the
| new school men knew nothing, it was likewise
made apparent that the Buncombes of antiquity
were equally in the dark DR.. Beales did all
this. Let us glorify him. He is greater than
DR.. Barnum, or Doctor Buncombe himself
Such miracle as has been wrought in the
Academy has astounded the public not little.
Everybody is keeping sharp lookout for their
organs, and shuddering ct the sight of the doc
tors chaise. The only persons that are really
delighted at the discontinue of the butchers and
the buncombes are the irregular guerilla prac-
titioners, who are called by the Academy savants,
quacks, although many of them have received
what is called professional education. OF
course these guerilla doctors, whose attacks
upon the regulars are frequent and bitter are
perfectly delighted with the grand row that has
weakened the enemy's camp, and left it at the
mercy of its foes. Some Of the pill men have