The next person who questioned me was a wag, who began by asking if I had ever seen amputation performed; and I replying in the affirmative, he shook his head and said, "What! upon a dead subject, I suppose ?" "If," continued he, "during an engagement at sea, a man should be brought to you with his head shot off, how would you behave ?" After some hesitation, I owned such a case had never come under my observation, neither did I remember to have seen any method of care proposed for such an accident, in any of the systems of surgery I had perused.
Whether it was owing to the simplicity of my answer, or the archness of the question, I know not, but every member at the board deigned to smile, except Mr.Snarler, who seemed to have very little of the 'animal risible' in his constitution.

The facetious member, encouraged by the success of his last joke, went on thus: "Suppose you was called to a patient of a plethoric habit, who has been bruised by a fall, what would you do ?" I answered, "I would bleed him immediately." "What!" said he, "before you had tied up his arm ?" But this stroke of wit not answering his expectation, he desired me to advance to the gentleman who sat next him; and who, with a pert air, asked, what method of cure I would follow in wounds of the intestines.

I repeated the method of care as it is prescribed by the best chirurgical writers, which he heard to an end, and then said with a supercilious smile, "So you think with such treatment the patient might recover ?" I told him I saw nothing to make me think otherwise.

"That may be," resumed he; "I won't answer for your foresight, but did you ever know a case of this kind succeed ?" I acknowledged I did not, and was about to tell him I had never seen a wounded intestine; but he stopt me, by saying, with some precipitation, "Nor never will! I affirm that all wounds of the intestines, whether great or small, are mortal." "Pardon me, brother," says the fat gentleman, "there is very good authority--" Here he was interrupted by the other with--"Sir, excuse me, I despise all authority--Nullius in verbo--I stand on my own bottom." "But sir, sir," replied his antagonist, "the reason of the thing shows--" "A fig for reason," cries this sufficient member; "I laugh at reason; give me ocular demonstratio." The corpulent gentleman began to wax warm, and observed, that no man acquainted with the anatomy of the parts would advance such an extravagant assertion.

This inuendo enraged the other so much, that he started up, and in a furious tone exclaimed: "What, Sir! do you question my knowledge in anatomy ?" By this time, all the examiners had espoused the opinion of one or other of the disputants, and raised their voices altogether, when the chairman commanded silence, and ordered me to withdraw.