Page:A Short History of Aryan Medical Science.djvu/214

owing to a variety of causes, the chief among them being the aversion of the Brahmans, who had the monopoly of teaching the various sciences, to animal food and to the sacrificial offerings which were too common in the pre-Budhistic period. This aversion made them shrink from touching the carcasses necessary for anatomical demonstrations. They also shrank from coming in contact with blood, pus, and other matter, which cannot be avoided in performing surgical operations. Surgery being neglected by the priestly caste, passed into the hands of the lower classes, whose practice was purely empirical. Even these people, for want of encouragement, allowed it to decline, until, as Mr Elphinstone rightly remarks, bleeding was left to the barber, bone- setting to the herdsman, and the application of blisters to every man.