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their use. The object of their going to a station in preference to being operated on at
their own houses is to prevent the unwelcome inspection visits of the vaccinator for
fear he should take lymph from their children's arms; the more distant, therefore, the
station, the better suited it is for their purpose of concealment. No amount of as-
surance on our part to respect their scruples and leave them unmolested could reassure
them. They were perfect strangers to animal vaccination. Long experience had
taught them that we had no alternative but to take lymph from successfully vaccinated
children to keep vaccination going, and they would not believe that we could get a
sufficient supply of lymph from heifers.
3. The same fear that makes the people prefer station vaccination, makes them
give us false addresses. This gives our vaccinators a considerable amount of unneces-
sary and useless trouble ; many ultimately remain unseen, and their results consequently,
unknown. Ignorant and illiterate as they generally are, they cannot very well be
blamed for this natural anxiety to save their children the pain and themselves the
trouble and annoyance of going all the way to the station, and being detained there for
some time. I beg to go even beyond this, and assert that something much worse than
pain is often the result of the taking of lymph from a child. They cannot be made to
understand that the very safety of their children which they so much desire and are
anxious for, requires that the result be seen by persons competent to judge of the
success or failure of the operation. They have seen perhaps their own children vac-
cinated, and whether seen or not by the vaccinator afterwards, they have been all the
same-protected from small-pox. This is their experience ; and it is enough for them
to know that, irrespective of the vaccinator seeing the result, vaccination does protect,
and has protected many. They do not care to know more. The progress of the
vaccine vesicles in successful cases of vaccination, is very often chequered owing to the
carelessness and inattention of the parents ; but notwithstanding all this, the protection
given by vaccination must have been very great to have so much secured the confidence
of the people. This is a cheering and hopeful sign, and by and by, should I continue
to succeed in obtaining with our animal lymph similar results to the present, I hope
and fully expect to be able to inspire still more confidence, and make them as anxious
to have the result ascertained as they are now for the operation. For the same experience
that makes them now view with suspicion and distrust all the movements of the vaccina-
tors, will convince them that their scruples and prejudices are really respected, and no
harm possibly comes by bringing the child for the inspection of the vaccinator.
4. For all this however, I would still urge the necessity of a compulsory Vacci-
nation Act. For it will take time before the general public is fully reassured, and
during this time many valuable lives will unnecessarily be sacrificed. Besides, except
in the fisherman caste, better known as Kolies, the Act will not exert any pressure upon
any body, at least pressure that would be felt as a grievance or as an encroachment on
the liberty of the subject. The Act will simply have the effect of stimulating them a
little, rousing them from their natural apathy, indifference, and improvidence, as the