Human Vivisection A STATEMENT AND AN INQUIRY "Is Scientific murder a pardonable crime? That is the question."-Rene Bache. " To whomsoever in the cause of Science, the agony of a dying rabbit is of no consequence, it is likely that the old or worthless man will soon be a thing which in the cause of learning may well be sacrificed."-Judge A. N. Waterman. CHICAGO, ILL. THE AMERICAN HUMANE ASSOCIATION 560 Wabash Avenue 1899 THE AMERICAN HUMANE ASSOCIATION John G. Shortall, President. Francis H. Rowley, Secretary. E. C. Parmelee, Treasurer. Societies of the United States, Organized for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and Children. Dear Sir:- A document recently issued by the United States Govern- ment (Senate Document, No. 78) contains matter of such great importance, that it has been decided to reprint that portion which treats of Human Vivisection, and to place a copy in the hands of those who contribute to the forma- tion and guidance of public opinion in the United States. The phrase Human Vivisection must not be taken as having any reference to the experimental use by physicians of new methods or new remedies, with a view to the benefit to the patient. To such tests, in the vast majority of instances, there can be no objection. But Human Vivi- section is something entirely different. It has been defined as "the practice of subjecting human beings, men, women and children, who are patients in hospitals or asylums, to experiments involving pain, mutilation, disease or death, for no object connected with their individual benefit, but entirely for scientific purposes." Accepting this definition of the phrase, what is your opinion of such experiments as those detailed in the fol- lowmg pages? In each case, the authority is given. The italics are ours. Would you say,-as many do regarding animal vivisec- tion,-that "morality has nothing to do with a scientific method?" If so, would you think that the personal judg- ment of any scientific man should alone determine what persons, and how many, he may secretly devote to disease, 2 Human Vivisection. mutilation or death, in the prosecution of his researches? Do you consider that experiments, such as are here given, should be absolutely without supervision or control? Or, would you, on the contrary, agree with the Ameri- can Humane Association, that the practice of Human Vivisection is so absolutely opposed to the spirit of natural and revealed religion, to Justice and Humanity, that it should be entirely prohibited and made a crime? Some expression of your opinion regarding the experi- ments here related, and upon the subject generally,-to the publication of which you would have no objection,-is hereby solicited. Respectfully, President. Secretary. April 13, 1899. Please address reply to Francis H. Rowley, D.D., Secretary, 163 Winter Street, Fall River, Mass. [Reprinted from Senate Document, JJo. 78.] HUMAN VIVISECTION. On January 27, 1899, there appeared among the cable dis- patches from Europe, two items that sent a thrill of horror and amazement throughout the civilized world. They tell the story of what is being done to-day in the name of science, in a land where vivisection is without control or supervision, and where new-born children are "cheaper" than dogs and cats: MURDERED IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE-REVELATIONS CONCERNING PRAC- TICES OF PHYSICIANS IN VIENNA. London, January 26.-The Vienna correspondent of the Morning Leader says: "It has been discovered that the physicians in the free hospitals of Vienna systematically experiment upon their patients, especially new-born children, women who are enceinte, and persons who are dying. In one case the doctor injected the bacilli of an infectious disease from a decomposing corpse into thirty-five women and three new-born children. In another case a youth, who was on the high road to recovery, was inoculated, and he died within twenty-four hours. Many dying patients have been tortured by poisonous germs, and many men have been inoculated with contagious diseases. One doctor, who had received an unlimited number of healthy children from a foundling hospital for experimental purposes, excused himself on the ground that they were cheaper than animals." VIVISECTION WORK IN AUSTRIAN HOSPITALS-PRACTICE IN CHARITY WARDS-SERIOUS CHARGES BROUGHT BY THE DEUTSCHE VOLKSBLATT- OPERATONS FOR EXPERIMENTAL PURPOSES. Vienna, January 25.-The Deutsche Volksblatt makes some startling charges against hospitals here. It alleges that vivisection is practiced in the charity hospitals, and declares that many patients have under- gone needless operations, which were made solely as experiments. Eighty cases are cited of children being inoculated with disease germs, and it is alleged the same thing was done in maternity cases, so that infants were born suffering from loathsome diseases. The victims num- ber into the hundreds. The Volksblatt demands the suppression of these outrages. No one can read the account of these horrible crimes without questioning whether such scientific atrocities may not be pos- sible in America. If the vivisection of animals, carried to any extreme desired, has produced the murder of children in 4 Human Vivisection. Vienna, may it not have precisely the same outcome in this country, where it is equally without restraint? Are there phy- sicians connected with the hospitals of our great cities who would dare to perform experiments upon the sick and suffer- ing committed to their care-experiments made without any idea of helpfulness or benefit to the patient, but solely for scien- tific ends? Would not the publication of such awful experi- ments in any medical journal in America, awaken in the Medical profession such a chorus of universal condemnation as would cover the perpetrators with everlasting obloquy? Or, on the contrary, is there no danger of such condemnation? It is well that we can answer these questions by a statement of facts. Human vivisection is only the natural and inevitable outcome of the claim that science has nothing to do with morality; that the discovery of a new fact is the highest object of man's existence; that "the aim of science is the advance- ment of human knowledge at any sacrifice of human life," and that no restriction, regulation, or supervision of any kind should be placed by the law upon the work of the vivisector. Let us see where these principles lead. I. Vivisection-Experiments Upon the Insane. In the "Bulletin of the Johns Hopkins Hospital" for July, 1897, appears an article entitled "Poisoning with prepara- tions of the Thyroid Gland," by Henry J. Berkley, M.D., of the Johns Hopkins University. Recognizing the fact that the extract of the thyroid gland, when administered to human beings, produces poisonous symptoms, and that "when this administration is pushed even to a moderate degree, death is almost invariably the result," he decided to experiment upon eight insane patients of the City Asylum. There is not the slightest intimation that the administration of the poisonous substance was given for any beneficial purpose to the patient. On the contrary, Dr. Berkley states that "it was directly for the purpose of ascertaining the toxicity (or poisonous quali- ties) of one of the best-known varieties of the thyroid extract that the following scries of experiments was undertaken:" "The first portion of the investigation was made upon eight patients at the City Asylum, who, with one exception (No. i), had passed or were about to pass the limit of time in which a recovery could be Human Vivisection. 5 confidently expected. To these patients the thyroid tablets * * * were administered, the dosage beginning always with a single pill daily for a period of three days; then, after a certain tolerance had been established, the dosage was increased to two tablets daily, and unless the symptoms became grave the number of pills was increased to three daily, the length of continuance depending upon results. Loss of weight always attended the administration of the tablets, as did disturbances of the circulation. * * * Irritability and a greater or less degree of mental and motor excitement were remarked in all cases, no matter how depressed or demented they had been previous to the administrations. Two patients became frenzied, and of these one died before the excitement had subsided. Case II. Olivia P., aet. 27. Patient was deeply demented, and quiet for several months before the thyroid treatment began. She lost flesh very rapidly. On the eleventh day of the treatment showed pro- nounced mental and motor excitement. On the twelfth day she passed into a state of frenzy. The-thyroid extract was now discontinued, but the excitement kept up for seven weeks, at the end of which time she died. Case III was good-tempered, but on the seventh day of the adminis- tration became irritable, and 'by the fifteenth day he was so quarrel- some that it was necessary to restrain him.' Case IV was 'quiet and not at all irritable,' but after the experiment on him his course 'was rapidly downward, and he became absolutely demented and degraded.' Case V apparently had been 'quiet for some months,' but after the experiment upon him began 'he became much excited.' Case VI was 'never excited,' but after three weeks' administration 'has become very irritable, restless, and difficult to control.' " "The above experiment upon eight human subjects." These are the words with which Dr. Berkley, of Johns Hopkins Hospital, characterizes his own investigations! It was not legitimate treatment; it was human vivisection. In December, 1895, and the early part of 1896, Dr. Went- worth, the assistant physician in a department of Harvard Medical School, performed an experimental vivisection of a considerable number of babies, in order to determine whether tapping of the spinal canal was dangerous or otherwise. He reported his experiments to the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. If that journal ever made any protest against such vivisection of infants, it has not been observed. The following is a brief abstract of some of these experiments: II. Vivisection of Children. 6 Human Vivisection. Case I. Female, aged 29 months. Entered hospital December 8, 1895. * * * Lumbar puncture performed at time of death. Case II. Female, aged 20 months. First puncture January 16, 1896; second puncture January 23, 1896; third puncture February 16, on the day of the patient's death. Case III. Female, aged 4 months. Puncture, January 17, 1896. Patient died January 22. A physician, writing to a medical journal, The Philadelphia Polyclinic, of September 5, 1896, characterizes these experi- ments in the following terms: HUMAN VIVISECTION. Recent numbers of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal contain a paper recording some experiments made on infants to determine whether lumbar puncture of the subarachnoid space is dangerous. The article in question had been read, the author tells us, before two medical societies, and recounts how on more than forty occasions he tapped experimentally the spinal canal of infants whose symptoms presented no indication for such a surgical procedure. Before the inauguration of these experiments the author had per- formed lumbar puncture-a proper therapeutic operation-on a case of doubtful tubercular meningitis. The child's pulse on that occasion rose to 250. "She clutched at her hair, tossed herself about the bed, and uttered sharp cries." H.e "was unprepared for such a result and did not know but that it would terminate fatally." The patient, how- ever, recovered from these alarming symptoms, and finally left the hos- pital perfectly well. It then occurred to him that operative disturbance of normal pressure within the cerebro-spinal canal might be a dangerous procedure, though the effect of a diminution of the increased pressure in meningitis be harmless. He accordingly determined to test this question o*n human beings intrusted to his professional care. As the desired material con- sisted of infants from a few weeks to a few years of age, he presuma- bly did not have to ask their consent to the experiment, and it is probable that he did not explain his desires to or obtain the consent of the mothers of the little ones. He justifies this experimental vivisection by saying: "The diagnos- tic value of puncture of the subarachnoid space is so evident that I considered myself justified in incurring some risk in order to settle the question of its danger." It must be remembered that there were no therapeutic indications for the operation, such as often lead us to justly and properly adopt operative treatment the positive value of which is still undetermined. These operations were purely and avowedly experimental, though it must be mentioned that the operator was not so callous but that he, according to his report, made preparations for an emergency. For- Human Vivisection. 7 tunately for the victims, nothing occurred to alarm the experimenter. It is true that the momentary pain of the puncture caused the patients to shrink and cry out, but "that was all." Two of the children were subjected to this experimental pain four times within a few days. It is difficult to portray in calm words the thoughts aroused by the perusal of this article. It is to be hoped that some true physician was present when the paper was read to show the enormity of the author's crime and the disgrace that must come to medicine if such practices are encouraged or tolerated. The account of the action of this man-we dislike to call him a phy- sician-is enough to justify the prejudice against hospitals which we find deeply rooted among the poor, and constantly combat as ignorant and superstitious. He does not tell us definitely whence the patients came; but they apparently were hospital inmates, whom he was sup- posed and professionally bound to treat with humanity-and skill. If the needs of Science seemed to him to irresistibly demand that the normal cerebro-spinal canals should be punctured, why did he not courageously bare his own back to the aspirator needle? Then we could honor him for his fearless love of Science. Now we despise him for his cruelty to the helpless. The New York Medical Record-one of the leading medi- cal journals in the United States-in its issue of September 10, 1892, published an original article by an American physician, now resident in San Francisco, on the origin of leprosy. While acting as the physician and surgeon in charge of the Govern- ment "free dispensary" at Honolulu, the idea occurred to him of making an experiment upon children by inoculating them with the most loathsome and terrible disease to which the human race is subject. They were already suffering from one incurable disease, and the object of the experiment was to ascertain whether with another, and even worse disorder, they might not be infected. III. Children Inoculated with a Loathsome Disease. On November 14, 1883, I inoculated * * * with the virus of syphilis the arms of six leper girls under 12 years of age. December 14, following, I repeated the experiment. * * * The last time I inoculated fourteen lepers. No result followed in any of the twenty experiments. Since coming to San Francisco T have tried, on several occasions, to get the opportunity (to inoculate a leper with syphilitic virus), but so far without success. * * * While the twenty cases in which I inoculated syphilis on lepers are not absolutely conclusive, still it is a point worth consideration. It is to be hoped that this experi- ment should be tried by competent observers under more favorable circum- stances. 8 Human Vivisection. It is impossible to print the full details of these utterly loath- some and abominable experiments. We can not believe that such experiments were made upon little girls with their con- sent or with any comprehension of intent; and we are, there- fore, driven to believe that this American physician, who to-day is practicing his profession among the sick and suffer- ing of San Francisco, made these awful experiments under the guise of administering a remedy for their complaints! And not a single medical journal in the United States which has pro- tested against the regulation or supervision of the vivisection of animals, has uttered the faintest protest, or a single word of criticism regarding these human vivisections. IV. Inoculation of Human Beings with a Fatal Disease. In the British Medical Journal for July 3, 1897, there appeared an account of one of the most startling cases of human vivisection which has thus far come to light. An Italian experimenter, Dr. Sanarelli, residing at Montevideo, in South America, having, as he thought, detected the specific germ that causes yellow fever, determined to experiment with it upon human beings. Where should he obtain his victims? The associate editor of the New England Medical Monthly (March, 1898) tells us that "he obtained his material from a lazaretto (or quarantine station) on Flores Island, and also from the hospital of St. Sebastien." We see that in the vivi- section of man, the hospital patient, even in the mind of a New England editor, becomes merely "material." Sanarelli himself says: "My experiments an man reached the number of five. In two indi- viduals I have experimented on the effects of subcutaneous injections of the germ culture, and in the other three, that of intravenous injec- tions. * * * The injection of the filtered culture reproduced in man typical yellow fever. The fever, the congestions, the vomiting, the hemorrhages, the fatty degeneration of the liver, the headache, the backache, the inflammation of the kidneys, the jaundice, the delirium, the final collapse; in fine, all that conjunction of symptoms which con- stitutes the basis of the diagnosis of yellow fever I have seen unrolled before my eyes, thanks to the potent influence of the yellow-fever poison made in my laboratory." Human Vivisection. 9 The Washington correspondent of the Boston Transcript, who would seem to be unusually well informed in matters of science, writing from that city September 24, 1897, says: "The newest scientific sensation is the revelation of the extraordi- nary methods pursued by Sanarelli in his study of the germ of yellow fever. * * * It appears that he has not hesitated to inoculate healthy human beings with the most fatal of infective diseases in order to prove the verity of his microbes. This he was able to do at the quarantine station on the island of Flores, near Montevideo, because in that part of the world lives are extremely cheap where the lowest orders of the people are concerned, and no law stepped in to stay the hand of the bold experimenter. It is understood that some if not all of the per- sons inoculated died of the disease. * * * Unscientific persons may be disposed to criticise such experimentation upon human beings. * * * The question is merely whether any man is warranted in assuming such a responsibility? Is scientific murder a pardonable crime? That is the question." That is one question. There are others. If these experi- ments in murder were possible in Montevideo because "no law stepped in to stay the hand of the bold experimenter," how is it with us, whose hospital patients even in Boston and Balti- more seem to be equally exposed to the lust for human vivi- section? There is not a medical journal in the United States which at the time did not make some reference to the human experimentation of Sanarelli. Was there a single one which added a word of protest or disapproval? These experiments were condemned. By whom? By those who are asking that the practice of animal vivisection in the District of Columbia shall be made subject to the law. At the convention of the American Humane Association held at Nashville, Tenn., October 14, 1897, one of the speakers criti- cised these experiments as follows: "What seems most pitiable to me is the helpless condition of these victims of scientific research. Whether men, women, or children, it was necessary that they should be ignorant, so that they should not be able to connect their future agonies with the man who had simply pricked them with a needle; they must be so poor and friendless that no one would care to interest the authorities in their behalf; and they must be absolutely in the experimenter's power. All these conditions seem to have been met. Apparently the victims were newly arrived 10 Human Vivisection. emigrants from Europe, detained at a quarantine station on an island, doubtless belonging to what an American writer has distinguished as 'the lowest orders of the people'-people such as were probably your ancestors and mine when they set sail from Europe two centuries ago; the 'common people' of modern society. For some trifling ailment they submitted to inoculations. Then they became the prey of fever. Day after day the scientist doubtless visited the bedside of his victims, not as a physician to heal their disease, but only to watch their sufferings. It may be that he seemed the very angel of pity and help to these poor creatures, when in reality he was engaged, as he tells us, in watch- ing 'the fever, the congestion, the hemorrhage, the vomit, the headache, the backaches, the inflammation of the kidneys, the jaundice, the deli- rium, the final collapse,' unrolled before his eyes, 'thanks to the potent influence of the poison' which he had administered. Some of us would call him a scientific murderer. Is he the type of a scientific investiga- tor to whose memory society may one day be asked to pay its tribute of honor and respect? Is he a man whom science would delight to honor to-day? I know that it has been suggested that 'unscientific persons may be inclined to criticise such investigations,' and that although they may be murders, yet, being done in the course of scientific investigations, they may be, after all, a 'pardonable crime.' On the contrary, it seems to me that possible utility has nothing whatever to do with our judg- ment of scientific assassinations like these. Granting all that could possibly be claimed for the usefulness to science of such experiments upon human beings, we have still to meet the question, not of their expediency, but of their justice. Should we, either as an association or as individuals, give our approval to human vivisections, secretly begun, and like these ending in torment and death, because of any pos- sible utility? At the close of the nineteenth century have we reached a point where murder for any purpose whatever can be made a matter of ethical controversy? Is it possible that science can put a gloss upon some of the most cowardly assassinations that the imagination can conceive? Are they less than murder because the victims were no relatives of ours, but poor, ignorant, and friendless, and 'strangers in a strange land?' " At this meeting, the American Humane Association adopted without a dissentient voice, a resolution denouncing in the most positive manner all such trifling with the sacredness of human life, and inviting the various scientific bodies of the United States to join with it in protest and condemnation. That invitation has not been accepted. Against any restriction or limitation of the right of a vivisector to subject animals to torment without giving a reason why, against any law reg- ulating the practice of vivisection, protests have been made by Human Vivisection. 11 the Chemical Society of Washington, by the Philosophi- cal Society of Washington, by the Entomological Society of Washington, by the National Academy of Sciences, by the American Medical Association, by the Association of American Physicians, and by various State societies throughout the United States; but so far as known, not a single scientific society in our country has ever made the faintest protest against the atrocious subjection of infants to mutilation, to inoculation with loathsome and sometimes fatal disease, or to any other form of human vivisection. Is there a single one of the above-named societies which by any formal resolu- tion has ever protested against the taking of human life for a purely scientific purpose? The correspondent of a great journal asks, as he reports the experiments of Sanarelli, "Is scientific murder a pardonable crime?" What is the answer to this ter- ribly significant question? We know the reply of some scien- tific teachers. Writing in the New York Independent, Decem- ber 12, 1895, one of them declares that- "A human life is nothing compared with a new fact in science. * * * The aim of science is the advancement 'of human knowledge at any sacrifice of human life. * * * If cats and guinea pigs can be put to any higher use than to advance science we do not know what it is. We do not know of any higher use we can put a man to." We have by no means exhausted the record of human vivi- sections, even in the Western Hemisphere. Sufficient instances have been adduced to show that the practice obtains here in America; and that it is here condoned by significant silence, and by absence of all condemnation on the part of scientific bodies. But underlying the practice of human vivisection there is a danger to human society. Between those who demand that the vivisection of animals shall be without restriction or restraint and those who defend or practice human vivisection there is a common bond of sympathy and belief. Says Judge Waterman: "To whomsoever, in the cause of science, the agony of a dying rabbit is of no consequence, it is likely that the old or worthless man will soon be a thing which in the cause of learning may well be sacrificed." We can never abolish the practice of Human Vivisection until we can compel science to 12 Human Vivisection. recognize, even within her own sphere, the supremacy of moral obligations. That recognition may be far distant. But until it is achieved the practice of animal vivisection as carried on to-day in our institutions of learning constitutes a far greater menace to human society than even anarchy or crime. The document issued by the United States Senate ends at this point. But the American Humane Association, desir- ing to ascertain the general sentiment of the people of this country in regard to the morality of the practice of Human Vivisection, ventures to extend the list and to call attention to certain other instances of such methods of experimentation. V. Experiments on Pauper Women and New-born Babies. In the "Deutsche Medicinische Wochenschrift" (The German Medical Weekly) of 1894, Nos. 46 to 48, Dr. K. Menge, of the University Hospital for Women in Leipsic, gives a report of a large number of experiments made by inoculating his patients with morbid material. He says: "The bacteria I used in my eighty experiments on thirty-five differ- ent patients of the 'Royal Institute' were taken either from diseased mammary glands; from the discharges of recently confined women, suffering from Puerperal Fever, or from cultivations I had made from the pus in the abdominal cavity of a person who had died of peritonitis. All the bacteria planted were capable of taking root and flourishing." Referring to the theories and methods of another physician, the experimenter adds: "My experiments on new-born babies (girls) dis- proved the correctness of the professor's deductions. Unfortunately, 1 could get only three babies to experiment on. These, 1 took immediately after birth. They were not bathed, but at once wrapped up in sterile linens, and carried to my laboratory. I inoculated these subjects with very considerable quantities of staphylococci," (disease-producing germs). Dr. Kroenig, assistant at the Leipsic University Clinic, reported that he had made similar experiments on eighty-two pauper women who zvere awaiting confinement at the "Royal Institute" above mentioned. His object was to observe the surest way of breeding purulent bacteria. Human Vivisection. 13 The American Humane Association would especially like to ascertain the judgment of American fathers and mothers upon such scientific use of new-born infants, thus removed from their mother to the laboratory of the vivisector, and there inoculated with loathsome diseases? Within the walls of such a Hospital, at the hands of such a physician,-has the phrase "Human Rights" any meaning whatever? VI. Inoculation with Germs of Consumption. In the German periodical above quoted, in the volume of 1891 (p. 306) a writer says: "I am sorry to say that it is very difficult to obtain subjects for such experiments. There are, of course, plenty of healthy children in consumptive families, but the parents are not always willing to give them up. Finally, I got a little boy for the purpose. The treat- ment to which I subjected him was to be a sort of punishment for some slight bit of naughtiness of which he had been guilty at home. I had been entreating the parents to let me have the boy for some time, but the father relented only when the child deserved punishment. He said to him: 'Now you shall be inoculated.' * * * My patient was very susceptible to the poison. After I had given him an injection of one milligramme, the most intense fever seized him. It lasted three or four days; one of the glands of the jaw swelled up enormously. I cannot yet say whether the boy will be consumptive in consequence of my treatment." VII. Children Cheaper than Calves for Vivisection. In a lecture before the Medical Society of Stockholm, May 12, 1891, Dr. Jansen of the Charity Hospital of that city reported certain experiments he had made. "When I began my experiments with black smallpox pus, I should, perhaps, have chosen animals for the purpose. But the most fit sub- jects, calves, were obtainable only at considerable cost. There was, besides, the cost of their keep, so I concluded to make my experiments upon the children of the Foundlings' Home, and obtained kind permission to do so from the head physician, Professor Medin. "I selected fourteen children, who were inoculated day after day. Afterward I discontinued them, and used calves. * * * I did not continue my experiments on calves long, once because I despaired of gaining my ends within a limited period, and again because the calves were so expensive. I intend, however, to go back to my experiments in the Foundling Asylum at some future time." 14 Human Vivisection. VIII. Human Vivisection in England. On January 26, 1899, the correspondent of the London Morn- ing Leader at Vienna telegraphed from that city, that he had interviewed a number of physicians regarding the revelations mentioned at the beginning of this article; and that none of them ventured to make a direct denial "that dangerous experi- ments had been practiced on patients." One distinguished sur- geon declared that "in most hospitals, patients are made use of in the Cause of Science. * * * I think you will find this sort of thing is carried on in Berlin and Paris, and also in London." The eminent surgeon was undoubtedly right. In England, Dr. Sydney Ringer, while Physician to the University College Hospital of London, frequently tested the poisonous effects of various drugs upon patients under his care, not for their bene- fit in any way, but solely as the vivisector would give the drug to a dog,-to observe the consequences. The following instances are taken from his work on "Therapeutics," pub- lished in this country, by Wm. Wood & Co. of New York City. (8th edition.) Poisoning with Salicine. "In conjunction with Mr. Bury, I have made some investigations concerning the action of salicine on the human body, using healthy children for our experiments, to whom we gave doses sufficient to produce toxic (poisonous) symptoms. "Our first set of experiments were made on a lad of ten. * * * He was admitted with belladonna poisoning, but our observations were not commenced until some days after his complete recovery." [This patient was therefore experimented on after his complete recovery, and when he should have been discharged from the hospital as cured.] Among the effects recorded during this experiment are "severe frontal headache, so severe that the lad shut his eyes and buried his head in his arm";-"became very dull and stupid, lying with his eyes closed";- "complained of tingling like pins and needles,"-and other symptoms indicating severe depression. In Case II, the experiments were made on a lad who had recovered from pneumonia, "his temperature having become normal ten days previously." After being duly poisoned, various symptoms are recorded,-vomiting, dulness, deafness, laboured breathing, spasmodic movements, and quickened respiration and pulse. In fact, his symp- toms frightened the vivisector: "we must confess we felt a little relief when the toxic (poisonous) symptoms, which became far more marked than we had expected, abated." (pp. 585, 588, 590, 591.) Human Vivisection. 15 If the lad had died, to what cause would his death have been ascribed in the hospital reports? In such case, would Dr. Sydney Ringer have been a murderer,-or what? Poisoning with Gelsemium. "Gelsemium," says Dr. Ringer, "is a powerful paralyzer and respiratory poison. * * * In order to test the effects on man, I gave it to six persons on seventeen occasions, in doses sufficient to produce decidedly toxic (poisonous) effects." "To test the effect of gelsemium on the circulation, I made thirty-three series of observations on patients, in whom we induced the full toxic (poisonous) effects." Among the symptoms which Dr. Ringer produced by this poison upon patients who supposed that they were receiving some remedy for their ailments, were pain, giddiness, dimness of sight, weakness in the legs and double vision. One patient described his pain "as if the crown of the head were being lifted off in two places"; "the headache and pain in the eyeballs were often severe, and were intensified on moving the eyes." "One patient, on both occasions on which I experimented on him, complained of a numb pain." (pp. 498-503-) Poisoning with Nitrite of Sodium. "To eighteen adults, fourteen men and four women-we ordered ten grains of pure nitrite of sodium in an ounce of water, and of these, seventeen declared they were unable to take it. One man, a burly, strong fellow, suffering only from a little rheumatism, said that after taking the first dose he felt giddy as if he "would go off insensible." His lips, face and hands turned blue, and he had to lie down an hour and a half before he dared to move. His heart fluttered, and he suffered from throbbing pains in the head. He was urged to take another dose, but declined on the ground that he had a wife and family. * * * The women appear to have suffered more than the men." * * * One woman "felt a trembling sensa- tion, and suddenly fell to the floor; whilst lying there she perspired profusely, her face and head throbbed violently until she thought they would burst. * * * Another woman said she thought she would have died, after taking a dose; in less than five minutes her lips turned quite black, and throbbed for hours; she was afraid she would never get over it." Drs. Ringer and Murrill in The Lancet, London, Nov. 3, 1883. There is not the slightest pretense that any of these adminis- trations of poison were made in way of medical treatment for the benefit of the patient, and Dr. Ringer constantly speaks of them as "experiments." Two questions suggest themselves. i. One cannot carry on a series of poisonings without,- now and then,-"unfortunate accidents." Perhaps all of Dr. Ringer's experiments were exceptionally fortunate, but how do 16 Human Vivisection. we know? If death should occur during such experiments on a hospital patient, how would it be reported to the authorities ? 2. A scientific experimenter upon Human Beings has no malice toward his victims, nor any desire to cause their death. But if death occurs, under what existing law, in England or America, can a scientific investigator be punished? In June, 1891, a paper was read by Professor Cornel before the Academy of Medicine at Paris on the subject of cancer- grafting. Therein, it was stated that two women, hospital patients, were operated upon for removal of cancer of the breast. While each was under chloroform, the surgeon took occasion to engraft portions of the cancer he had just removed, upon the breast of the other side, which was at that time perfectly healthy, and both of these grafts developed into cancerous tumors. Similar experiments are reported in the Medical Press (Eng- land) of Dec. 5, 1888. In the discussion that followed the publication of Dr. Cornel's paper, the fact was brought out that such experiments had been carried on for years by two surgeons attached to hospitals of Berlin. What is the opinion of American women regarding a sur- geon who extirpates a cancer on one side, and at the same time produces another cancer on the opposite side, by "grafting" it into a healthy breast? IX. Inoculation with Cancer. X. Vivisection of the Rich. Because in the foregoing instances Human Vivisection seems to select for its victims the new-born babe, the deserted or outcast mother, the friendless, the ignorant, the poor, per- haps some reader may fancy that at least no danger of this nature can ever threaten his own loved ones. It may be that he says: "Let Science work her will on these lower orders of Humanity ; we, at least, are secure, guarded by social position, protected by wealth." If so, one forgets History. Once the foundations of morality are undermined concerning the sacredness of human life, and there is safety for no one. Did Nihilism spare the Czar? Did Anarchy respect an Empress? If we may trust the warnings' of those men who should know the truth, the lust for experi- Human Vivisection. 17 mentation in certain directions long since overleapt the gates of the hospital, and to-day finds victims elsewhere than among the poor. Dr. J. Burney Yeo, a leading physician of London, writing in the Nineteenth Century for December, 1895, refers to the charge that "surgical operations are now constantly performed, not for the advantage of the patients, but for the pecuniary benefit of the operators. This is really a very serious charge, and, I deeply grieve to think, one not altogether unfounded." Medical Reprints in its issue of May 16, 1893, says: "Professors Leon Le Fort, Verneuil, Duplay and Tillaux of Paris, have been asked by a public journal for their opinion on the operative mania said to be prevalent at present. * * * Prof. Le Fort, in a long letter, protested against the custom among young French surgeons, in order to bring their names before the public, to seek out some operation unknown in France, and then seek out a victim on whom they can perform it. Prof. Verneuil protests against the abuse of opera- tions, and especially of gyncecological operations (those performed on women.) He deplores the prurigo scandi,-"the itch for cutting,"- with which so many French surgeons are attacked." Dr. Clifford Allbut, in delivering the Gulstonian lecture before the Royal College of Physicians, London, denounced in no uncertain terms methods of medical practice which cer- tainly have a very close affinity to Human Vivisection. Referring with compassion to the sufferings of women, he men- tioned "the morbid chains" and the "mental abasement" into which fall certain patients, "the women who are caged-up in London back drawing-rooms, and visited almost daily, their brave and active spirits broken under a false belief in the presence of a secret and over-mastering malady, and the best years of their life honored only by a distressful victory over pain." Medical Press, March 19, 1884. Dr. J. Russell Reynolds, F.R.S., Fellow of the Royal Col- lege of Physicians, and editor of a "System of Medicine" pub- lished both in England and America, made equally grave charges in an address before a medical society, reported in the British Medical Journal, Oct. 15, 1881. 18 Human Vivisection. "There is 'meddling and muddling' of a most disreputable sort. * * * Physicians have coined names for trifling maladies,-if they have not invented them,-and have set fashions of disease. They have treated,-or maltreated-their patients * * * sometimes for years, and when, by some accident, the patient has been removed from their care, she has become quite well!" It is evident that in these terrible charges, they are not pauper patients, who have been "maltreated for years." Dr. Edward Berdoe, member of the Royal College of Sur- geons, and a well-known London practitioner, recently wrote to the editor of the London Chronicle as follows: Sir: The community at large is deeply indebted to you for your bold and outspoken protest against the Vivisection of Human Beings, espe- cially in connection with hospitals for women. These things have been exposed and protested against by the older school of practitioners for many years past. In the British Medical Journal of May 27, 1887, Dr. C. H. Stratz is quoted with reference to his severe strictures on "The Operative Madness" {Furor Operativus.') "It is astonishing," he says, "to read on what slight excuse a difficult and dangerous operation was performed." In the same journal, Jan. 5, 1878, there is a report of a very terrible operation, which seems to have caused the death of several patients. A great physician present asked: "Why was it done?" In my own practice I have had two cases of women who were about to be subjected to operations of the gravest charac- ter, and who both speedily recovered their health by changing their minds, and leaving the hospital, where the operations were to have been performed. * * * They are now perfectly well, so that the evisceration to which they would have been subjected had they taken the advice of the hospital people, could never have been necessary. The fact is, Sir, the rage for mangling animals in the cause of physio- logical science has developed this operative madness against which your correspondent protests. It is the young vivisecting school which is at the bottom of the mischief, and it must be checked by some such means as those you suggest, or our hospitals,-as you say,-will be turned into butchers' shops." The foregoing record of Human Vivisections is by no means complete, but the few instances brought forward afford fair examples of the practice which, within the last fifty years, has been introduced from the Age of Paganism into the civi- lized world. By the great majority of those who compose the Medical profession in the United States, we believe that such experiments as these will be unhesitatingly condemned. Dr. Hwm Vwisection. 19 Berdoe has undoubtedly revealed the true source of this lust for human beings as objects of scientific experimentation; the practice is merely the legitimate result of the exaltation of Scientific research above all moral considerations. Upon these experiments; upon the spirit which underlies them; upon the question whether they should be forbidden or encouraged,- The American Humane Association invites a personal .expression of opinion from all to whom this pamphlet shall come. HUMANE LITERATURE. The American Humane Association was organized in 1877, for the purpose of promoting unity and concert of action among the American societies, having for their object the prevention of Cruelty to children and animals. For nearly twenty-two years it has endeav- ored to carry out this purpose, principally through deliberative con- ventions, held annually in various cities throughout the Union, and in Canada. At the last meeting of the Association in Washington, D. C., it was decided somewhat to enlarge its field of activity, and to make the Association more of an Educational force in awakening public sentiment to the need of various reforms. The principal methods through which the American Humane Association will aim to accomplish this purpose is by the systematic distribution of Humane Literature. So far as funds permit, it pro- poses to promulgate the ideals of humane conduct in every direction where necessity exists. Among the subjects regarding which it would seek more thoroughly to arouse public sentiment are the abuses connected with the treatment of domestic animals; the transportation of cattle; their slaughter for food; the extermination of birds for the demands of fashion; the abuses of vivisection when carried on, as now, without State supervision or control; the cruelties pertaining to child-life, and above all, the great and growing abomination of Human Vivisection, in the subjection of children to scientific experi- mentation as described in the present pamphlet. The extent to which this work can be carried out will depend upon the assistance received. All interested are urgently solicited to con- tribute towards this object. Every dollar so contributed will be devoted exclusively to the publication and dissemination of Humane Literature. Should subscribers desire their contributions to be espe- cially devoted to any one of the above lines of this humanitarian work, their preferences will be observed. Francis H. Rowley, D.D., Treas. Humane Literature Committee, No. 163 Winter street, Fall River, Mass.