Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1900-12-01

'AN 'oN w HAA tilS UiStstSt has ttldle
in the past is apparent in the holocaust
effected in Mexico and the veritable
slaughter in India. In the two years as
late as 1SI4-15 ha'f a million
people in the presidencies of Bonn
bay alone fell victims to smallpox.
In 1860, '.eeo natives died in less than two
months. 1t constituted to 8 per cent of
the total mortality in England in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,
and nearly 9 per cent of that of the city
of Berlin in 17S3-ST. In France during the
whole of the eighteenth century. 5000
people died annually of smallpox. Whole
races or men We're carried off in Brazil,
one-third Of the population Of Green
land in 1884. 1t is computed of the CEN
fury preceding vaccination that fifty
millions of people died in Europe of small
pox. The human race was beaten down
until men became resigned to the disease.
Macaulay called it tie most terrible Of
all the ministers of death.
JENNER'S GREAT DISCOVERY.
Vaccination tfrom vacca. a COW; vac
cinia, COW rox) is a term introduced
from France to express the incubation
OF man with cowpox in prevention of
smallpox. and to substitute the awk-
ward word 'cowpoNing.". The promul-
cation Of vaccination by Edward Jenner
in 1928 constitutes one of the great
epochs in the history of mankind. in that
from this period the terrible tropical
plague variola, which overran and liter
ally ruined Europe and the rest of the
world, was reduced to the trivial malady
varioloid. which Is, uncomplicated, never
fatal.
Jenner was a medical apprentice at
Sodbury, England, when he became ac-
quainted with the popular belief in the
protective influences OF coWpoX. He Wis
tied diaries in Worcestershire and made
observations and prosecuted investiga-
tions for himself. He found there existed
a widespread belief among the dairy
men that certain individuals, who had
contracted sores upon their hands from
contact with sores on the udders Of cows,
We're never attacked With small pox.
Much contradictory testimony presented
itself at first, and many disheartening
exceptions We're ound. If genius be pa
thence. it found in Jenner an example for
Jenner worked with this subject for
more than twenty years before all the
mighty truth of it was clear to his mind.
May IA. 1895. was the memorable day
when Edward Jenner transferred cow
pox from vesicles on the hands of Sarah
Nelmes, a dairymaid. by means of two
SUpeilCldi lIislSiOnS. into the arms OF
James Phipps,a healthy boy eight years
OF age. The cowpox ran its ordinary
course, and a subsequent incubation
with smallpox on the first of the follow
ing July failed to produce the disc Ase. In
the same month Jenner wrote to his in
innate friend Gardner:
The boy has since been ~inoculated for
the smallpox, which, as | ventured to
predict, produced no effect. l shall now
pursue my Investigations with redoubled
ardor."
This was the first attempt of a simple
practice which has, in a little more than
a century afforded to all mankind pro-
lection from the ravages of smallpox.
Jenner was ed to make this experiment
~ the observation that individuals ac-
cidentally infected with cowpoX, to use
his own words, resisted every effort to
give them smallpox" A number Of chill
dren, subsequently, vaccinated in sue
c%ession, "one from the other" We're after
several months exposed to the infection
of smallpox. some by incubation,
others by various %effiuvia, and some in
both ways, but they all resisted It,"
Though Jenner was himself now thor
oughly convinced, he determined to
withhold his conclusions from publica-
ton until, by frequent repetition and
fertilization in every direction against
any possible error, he might establish
them beyond doubt. He repeated his
NEGOTIATIONS with every precaution, and
finally prepared his pamphlet. Here
upon he visited London to obtain the as
sent and support of his medical friends,
but was unable for nearly three months
to find any person in London who would
submit to the operation. Finally, on his
fptprO homo tho IiStip p, chad c,ruonn
Cline, introduced vaccine matter over
the diseased hip joint of a child as a
means of securing counter irritation.
When he found later that this child had
thus secured immunity against small
poX, he became an earnest advocate of
the operation, and a supporter of Jenner
at a time when the latter stood in neeG
of one. There is evidence that Jenner
worked with this subject, e~ncountering
and overcoming obstacles and opposition
on every hand, for over twenty years be-
fore he announced his results to the
world, and it is known that fully two
years elapsed-a delay which might be
considered culpable in our day-between
the first vaccination and the publication
of his paper.
Jenner lived to see all opposition over
come and the procedure adopted all over
the world, and to receive, with universal
honors and emoluments, from parliament
in 1902 an award of s1O, 900 (nearly all
of which was lost in fees). and later, in
1907. a second allowance of eco, 600. In
1857 a statue was erected to him in Ira
falgar square, in London. The most con-
summat eynic must admit that up to
the present time Edward Jenner has
been the greatest physician that the
world has known.
EASY TO GET AWAY.