Further details on this point belong more properly to the lecturer on Medical Law. We are now concerned with the principles underlying special legislation. The main principle regulating all compensation is that there shall be a sort of equality between the services rendered and the fee paid for them. Ignorant people sometimes find fault with the amount charged as a Doctor's fee. There may, of course, be abuses by excess; but men have no right to complain that a Doctor will ask as much for a brief visit as a common laborer can earn in a day. This need not seem unfair if it be remembered that the physician had to prepare, during many years of primary, intermediate, and professional studies, before he could acquire the knowledge necessary to write a brief prescription. Besides, it may be that his few minutes' visit is the only one that day; and yet he has a right to live in decent comfort on his profession together with those who depend on him for support. We must, however, remember, on the other hand, that excessive fees are nothing else than theft; for theft consists in getting possession of another's property without just title. The following rules of Dr. Ewell are sensible and fair: "The number of visits required must depend upon the circumstances of each particular case, and the physician is regarded by the law as the best and proper judge of the necessity of frequent visits; and, in the absence of proof to the contrary, it will be presumed that all professional visits made were deemed necessary and were properly made. "There must not be too many consultations. The physician called in for consultation or to perform an operation may recover his fees from the patient, notwithstanding that the attending physician summoned him for his own benefit, and had arranged with the patient that he himself would pay." (This, of course, does not mean that the practitioner has a right thus to shift the burden of pay from his own shoulders.) "Where a medical man has attended as a friend, he cannot charge for his visit. Where a tariff of fees has been prepared and agreed to by the physicians of any locality, they are bound by it legally as far as the public are concerned (that is to say, they cannot charge more than the tariff rates), and morally as far as they themselves are concerned" (p. 5).