The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1883-07-21
HONOLULU. HAWAIIAN ISLANDS, JULY 2L 1852

l found the lock ofthe drawer broken; locked uI
the record because l once found some leaves
gone; use the test both ways; red ltmus paper
is used for testing alkalis tumeric is fluid used
for testing.
By the eprosecutOn-Cave prescription for one
of the jurors to Mr. Mccartney TO put up, within
the last three days, that did not have iodide of
potass.
DIR. Trousseau, recalled by the defense-Some-
times the leper patients come to stand-stil, and
with Improvements in diet and mode of living,
improve without medical treatment.
Mr.. Dole for the defense expressed his re-
gret at keeping the jury so long on the case,
but lie thought it advisable owing to the inn
pOrtance of the case, and the interest felt
by all In the principle of the topic touched
upon. He then spoke substantially as fol-
/ lows: We have enough information be-
fore us now to give US more interest in the
subject. This great fear not only threatens
us, not only from the branch hospital but
from every point of the compass.
Medical men are constantly expressing
themselves in order to find out all they can
of the workings of the disease; no class can
/ call themselves safe; the question is
whether the management of this disease Is
| 1t is the duty
this subject in all it's Journalist to discuss
the methods of work carried on is their
! duty.
All of the medical men, with one excep-
tion are agreed that the disease Is incura-
BILE. The disease Is so loathsome that it is
worse than death; segregation and segrega-
ton alone is the only way that the disease
was driven into the corner of the old world;
this Government has been playing, and is
now playing with the subject; the specta-
Gle of the King going with the Board of
Health TO the leper settlement and releas-
ing those lepers who have improved in
health, with only one physician in attend
ance is a mournful one the whole manage
ment of the leper question is in the hands
of one man; he has great powers; the statute
of 1854 gives him almost absolute power; he
thinks there are some two or three hundred
| lepers at large; we have medical evidence
that new cases are to be met with every
day; we meet them every day and every
where; we find that DR.. Fitch's theories are
his own-his discovery; as an officer in
charge of the whole medical department,
for him to carry out his theory, justifies a
journalist in the strongest condemnation;
1t is the duty and privilege of taxpayers to
criticise the acts of public officers; the de-
fendant has no axe to grind; he has no more
interest at stake tiiII you have. Mr..
Thrum is on trial for his liberty; Dr.. Fitch
is deeply interested; the Crown has no other
interest than to prevent libel, as that leads
to disorder; the case is one in which the
system of DR.. Fitch is weighed, and it re-
mains for you to decide whether the de-
fendant is not worthy of praise for his
throwing himself into the breach and de-
Tending this community; the liberty of the
press is assailed in this case nothing pro-
tects this country from despotism as well
as freedom of the press; remember that DR..
Fitch is the only physician who says that
leprosy is not contagious; DIR. Trousseau
says he is afraid that flies and mosquitoes
carry the disease; suppose that south
wind should carry a hundred million mos
quitOes from the leper hospital over this
town. what would become of US? DR.. Fitch
has a diploma that bears date of March /;
this, / claim, is not the document referred
to in the certificate given to DR.. Fitch to
practise in California; DR.. Fitch's conduct
of the dispensary seemed to be of " dog in
the manger' policy, he examined three
hundred patients in six hours; Dr. Fitch
says he believes in segregation, and then
does not do so; why is this? Because the
man is dishonest man, that is one with
but weak sense of honor, and he did not
intend to carry out this plan of segregation
any more than he did to carry out the ten
commandments.
His actions do not begin to carry out the
principle he sets forth; his position cannot
be found out by his statements; he says If
" my views are correct, ieprOsy is not in-
fictitious or contagious; " there is SO much
doubt about its being more contagious that
segregation should be fully carried out; his
idea is that it is not inoculable; he tried to
show you how wives have lived with hus-
bands and vice versa with immunity from
disease; segregation has not been half car
ried out and it is not his intention to do
so; he has failed to show you a single case
of cure according to his own statement;
there is no other doctor in the community
that supports his views; he claims the iden-
tity of leprosy with syphilis as his own
discovery, but this has yet to be proven.
The article calls him comparative ig-
norant pretender, " and 1 submit to you Is
it not a fair criticism? When he was nine
months in the country he talked to laymen
OF what he was going to do and what he
can do-that he could and would cure lep-
charletan and of an ignorant pretender.
The evidence shows that DR.. Fitch has
pretended to have cured leprosy by taking
in people and keeping them for time, and
then discharging them as cured. a healthy
man was brought by him from Kauai to
Honolulu, kept for time, and afterwards
discharged as cured. And that is the way
he fills his office. He tried to get himself
made medical superintendent of the whole
group; to GUST men of well-knoWn ability.
He came down here from the Coast on a
salary of SO or 1925 a month, after being 10
years in practice. However big bis diploma,
he is not an educated physician. During
his ten years of practice he has not kept up
what he ought to have learnt during his
course of study. DR.. TrOusseau says eprosy
improves with good diet it is feature of
the disease that it improves on a change of
condition Of living; the very choicest speci-