1897 
THE FRENCH AND THE ENGLISH 
TREATMENT OF RESEARCH 
The 26th of December last was cold and misty as I passed through 
the gateway of Notre-Dame at 8 A.M. to take part in the funeral 
service of a man who had died a year and two months before. This 
man was the son of a tanner, and although he had lived for seventy- 
three years he knew not the world as most human beings know it, 
having opened up a world of his own in which he lived, moved, and 
worked. It was singular to think that this man, so perfectly simple- 
minded to the last, was brought, at the time of his death, to this 
temporary resting-place amidst all the pomp of a State funeral, in a 
city whose people know how to honour the living as well as the 
dead; and whose loss was felt to be the loss of all mations. After 
wandering about in the midst of the vast cathedral, I came at length 
upon the object of my search, the little chapel containing the remains 
of Louis Pasteur. Around this spot the immediate members of 
the family soon gathered, and presently the scene was changed 
from one of silence and solitude into one of ecclesiastical magnifi- 
cence, with the rich tones of the organ pealing forth the dirge, and 
stringed instruments and voices filling the air with divine melody. 
Notwithstanding the efforts of the family to keep the ceremony 
strictly private, it was impossible to restrain the intense enthusiasm of 
the public, who showed their reverence all along the line of route from 
the cathedral door, through streets some of which were named after 
him, to the Pasteur Institute. Here were assembled, for the second 
time, representatives of the Government, members of the French 
Academy, and delegates from the universities and scientific societies 
of Europe. At the entrance to the tomb a tribune was raised, from 
which laudatory orations were delivered in various languages before 
a dense concourse of people who had come from great distances to 
be present. Above the gateway of the tomb were the simple words, 
Id repose Pasteur. 
The crypt wherein he reposes was artificially illuminated through 
cupolas of pale yellow Algerian marble shedding a soft light through- 
out the interior, revealing a scene of exquisite beauty and grace. All 
Vol, XLII-No. 245 
113 114 
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
July 
around, the walls and roofs told mutely, but eloquently, of a life which 
had been given up to discovering the causes of death. Strange to 
say, the design of this beautiful tomb was suggested by one built 
1,456 years ago at Ravenna, by, and for, the Christian Empress 
Placidia, daughter of Theodosius the Great, where it was seen by 
Pasteur's son, under whose fostering care and that of the family 
the idea was now developed. Instead, however, of the walls represent- 
ing works of science as in this case, they of the fifth century repre- 
sented the Apostles and the triumph of the Christian faith. These 
were the Dark Ages of history, when the light of Christianity was only 
beginning to be diffused over the land, and science lay crushed under 
the heel of persecution. Here, then, was surely a wondrous occasion, 
the tomb of an early Christian Empress forming a model for the 
tomb of a latter-day man of science, with a religious and academic 
service happily combined, taking place in the presence of all manner 
of thinkers in perfect unity and harmony. After this ceremony 
was over admission was given to the public, when 25,000 persons 
visited the tomb. 
Two months after this I presented myself early one morning at the 
Institute to visit my friend Madame Pasteur, who still occupies the 
residence connected with the laboratory, as neither M. Duclaux (the 
new director) nor M. Roux would permit her to leave the home she had 
shared from the beginning with the master whom they loved and 
revered. Here she spends her time in taking an interest in all the 
work going on; in wandering about among the golden laurel wreaths 
and works of art showered upon her husband during life; and in 
taking charge of the innumerable Grand Crosses, medals, and other 
beautiful and treasured tokens of esteem. 
As the people were beginning to assemble for the anti-rabic 
inoculations, and I was anxious to visit the laboratory, we wended 
our way in that direction first. Entering the passage which led 
to these apartments, we stopped at a door on the right which I was 
told I might enter. On the other side of this door I found myself 
within a glass enclosure designed with a view to preventing the 
ingress of dust to the sanctum beyond. In the far corner of this 
dark room sat a trained assistant at a table under a single light. 
He was busy cutting up the spinal cords of rabbits that had 
died of dumb rabies, and which were brought to him suspended 
in glass jars by an assistant who never spoke. These little spinal 
cords looked like mere threads, and were in every stage of de- 
siccation, from the innocuous and quite dry, to the most virulent, still 
fresh and moist. In silence each labelled jar was brought from its 
wired cupboard in proper sequence, and the previous jar taken away. 
When these various marrows were mixed with a small quantity of 
bouillon, a row of covered and labelled wine-glasses denoted that all 
was ready. It was interesting to watch how every precaution was 1897 
FRENCH & ENGLISH TREATMENT OF RESEARCH 
115 
taken to prevent inimical germs getting access to the fluid which in 
a few minutes would be injected into the blood of the human beings 
now assembling. The system with which the whole thing is arranged 
and carried out indicates the most minute and scientific attention to 
detail. No loophole is left for danger to creep in, and here an example 
of caution is laid down that should be followed in all other human 
inoculations. No accidental virus must be allowed to interfere with 
the perfectly studied progress of events. It is curious to consider 
that the original venom of the mad dog should be thus intercepted 
and neutralised by a graduated virus which in its strongest form is 
even more virulent than the original virus of the mad dog; and that 
it can be so introduced into the blood that human beings can live, 
and not even suffer, with all this poison in them I These assistants 
and all the employes are previously rendered immune by inoculations 
before they are allowed to engage in the work. 
Stepping back into the passage once more, I found Madame Pasteur 
talking to a poor woman who had brought her little girl to be inocu- 
lated. She whispered to me it was too late, nothing could be done; 
fever had developed the night before, and the child was, even then, 
gazing up at us with fever in her eyes. 
In the large reception-room people. were arriving rapidly, people 
of every degree and in every stage of the treatment. The daily 
average is about eighty; six of these this morning were English, one 
or two having come from India. All are treated alike and free of 
charge. One poor little workhouse girl had been brought all the way 
from Ireland by the lady who accompanied her, but as she had been 
bitten through thick woollen clothes it was considered there was no 
danger, and no necessity for the treatment. After seeing a whole 
family of peasants inoculated who had been badly bitten on the face 
and hands, we pursued our way upstairs to see what was going on in 
the laboratories above. 
In the very first laboratory we entered we were shown a glass phial 
containing a number of beautiful crystals with clear-cut facets like 
diamonds. Now, these crystals had not been taken from the bowels 
of the earth, but they had been produced artificially through invisible 
agency in the most simple and natural way. A common domestic 
onion was left to itself, a prey to the organisms or moulds of the air 
at a temperature suitable to their development, and lo! through the 
action of these little chemists the material, or part of the material, of 
that onion was transformed into these pure crystals. But those were 
not the only crystals produced by microbes, for we were shown others 
which we were politely invited to taste, and after some encouragement 
■did taste and found the flavour delightful, being that of pure lemon. 
Now, there were no lemon trees growing within miles, yet here was 
fresh lemon grown in a cupboard amidst the terrible paraphernalia of 
a chemical laboratory! But again the method was very simple; 116 
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
July 
just a little sugar and water in a glass phial inoculated with some 
fungoid growth and placed in a culture chamber at 27° C., and in 
three weeks these lemon crystals were found lying at the bottom of 
the flask. This discovery of Pottevin's has already led to the forma- 
tion of a large company in Paris for the manufacture of lemonade by 
this process. 
Now in the scientific world it has been said that in the crystal lay 
' the mystery and miracle of vitality,' Pasteur maintaining that here 
a sharp line of demarcation existed between organic and inorganic 
nature, while Professor Tyndall and other chemists were of opinion 
that the barriers had been overcome and that all things in Nature 
were united in one unbroken chain. Here, then, we seemed to be in 
the very act of picking up the links which brought the organic and 
inorganic together, the visible and invisible world into unison. 
Passing into another laboratory, we found Metchnikoff studying 
the life history of bacteria when in the blood of man or animals. He 
showed us, under the microscope and in drawings, the white blood cells 
(which are always present with the red) in the act of absorbing patho- 
genic bacteria and digesting them at leisure, much as the oyster does 
with the bacilli of typhoid fever, which it can digest and get rid of in. 
a week, if there are no more to follow. M. Roux, in the opposite 
laboratory, was giving his mind to serums, having already with others 
worked out and established the antitoxin which is now so much used 
in diphtheria. It was deeply interesting to note the enormous 
amount of brain power working at every point under the same roof to 
penetrate the mystery of disease and the mechanism of immunity. 
In some cases the living organisms of disease may be seen at work by 
placing a drop of infected blood under the microscope, and for such- 
cases various methods of treatment have been found which destroy 
the organisms without killing the patient. But in other cases where 
no organisms are found in the blood the mystery is increased, and the 
difficulty of treatment is proportionately enhanced, for the symptoms 
of disease are actively present, and the physician has to deal with 
them at the bedside. For instance, in such deadly diseases as tetanus 
and diphtheria the living organisms do not enter the circulation, but 
stop short at the point of inoculation, and send through the blood 
the invisible poison they have the power to elaborate. Now, it was found- 
in the course of these researches that the blood serum of rabbits which 
had been rendered immune against tetanus and diphtheria had no 
power to'destroy or to retard the growth of the bacilli which caused 
these diseases at the point of inoculation, but it possessed the power 
of neutralising the poison they manufactured and sent through the 
blood. In short, the blood serum of the immunised rabbit was found 
to be an"antidote to the poison, but not a destroyer of the living 
bacteria. But to this I shall refer later. 
The savants whom I found in the midst of their work took the 1897 
FRENCH & ENGLISH TREATMENT OF RESEARCH 
117 
opportunity of expressing the deep interest they felt in the experi- 
ments of their late colleagues, Yersin and Haffkine, with the plague 
serum and cholera vaccine in India. They seemed to be in touch 
with all the researches going on in every part of the world. One of 
the great advantages of a central school like this is that it brings 
all the workers in similar schools together, thus throwing a concen- 
tration of light on one subject till it is thoroughly thrashed out and 
developed. It is, in fact, a vast brotherhood working in the cause of 
humanity. 
Returning home next day across the narrow streak which 
divides our proud little isle from the continent, the ease with which 
scientific researches are conducted on the one side of the Channel 
compared to the difficulties on the other could not fail to strike my 
mind. There the Pasteur Institute was erected as a thank-offering 
and tribute of respect to the founder of this new school, through the 
contributions of all nations save ours. Through an enlightened ap- 
preciation of the work being done, this living monument to Pasteur 
is perpetually being fed with votive offerings which pass through the 
grindstone of science, to come back, in various shapes, to the human 
■race enormously increased in value. In common with many other 
■individuals who contributed, the Comte de 1'Aubesppin gave l,600Z., 
while Madame Hirsch has recently given 2,000,000 francs (80,0001.), 
Another lady has founded four scholarships of 4,000 francs, or 160Z., 
each, and the town of Paris and Conseil General de la Seine are 
instituting others. Then the French Government, encouraged by 
public opinion, contributes a year, which is paid by the 
Minister of Agriculture, who thereby enjoys the perpetual right to a 
place for a pupil sent from the Ecole Normale. This Government 
pupil receives a salary of 2,800 francs (112£.) a year, which is paid by 
the Minister of Instruction, who also contributes towards the salary 
of two chefs de laboratoire, each receiving 4,000 francs (160Z.) a 
year, out of the fund for the ' Hautes Etudes.' Thus, abroad, science 
glides along under the happy auspices of enlightened public opinion, 
aided by the National Exchequer, while in England public opinion, 
being opaque to the advantages, fetters the hands that would help, 
and holds down this branch of science under the ban of unreasoning 
disapprobation. 
The result of this difference between the two nations was brought 
home to us in a somewhat embarrassing way not long ago, through a 
little correspondence which took 'place between M. le Clercq, the 
president of the French Shorthorn Society, and Lord Brougham and 
Vaux, the president of the English Shorthorn Society. It seems that 
the French Government, profiting by their subsidies to the Pasteur 
Institute, have decreed that ' all imported bovine stock shall be tested 
at the frontier, and if they react unfavourably to tuberculin, that 
they must be immediately slaughtered or returned to the country 118 
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
July 
whence they come.' Accordingly, when two important bulls had been 
purchased in England by French breeders (one being ' Nonsuch,' the 
champion of last year's Royal Show), and were tested according to 
law on the frontier, they were both found to be tuberculous, and 
therefore unfit for breeding purposes. ' You will understand,' wrote 
M. le Clercq to his lordship, ' our unfortunate position and the cruel 
loss to our Society, because if our colleagues will not give us the 
assurance that their stock is free from tuberculosis, our subsidies will 
be withdrawn by the French Government, and consequently no more 
English purchases will be made.' 
There is a calm dignity about this rebuke ; and not a word to 
suggest that we do not enjoy the same means of testing cattle for 
disease that they have. In circumstances such as these it is not 
difficult to see how impossible it will be for us to meet the require- 
ments of more advanced nations unless our Government also gives 
facilities to enable us to carry out the necessary conditions, for 
without the means of learning it is not easy, or even possible, to 
teach. 
We are much in the position now, so far as the teaching of this 
new science goes, that we were in fifty years ago, when the public 
were horrified with the stories of body-snatching which ended in the 
trial of Burke and Hare. How was it possible, argued the professors 
of human anatomy, to qualify the students for their future responsi- 
bilities towards the public, without teaching them the structures of 
the human body ? But it required the horrors of a public scandal 
to compel the Government to inquire into the existing state of 
things, and afford the medical schools the legitimate means of ac- 
quiring and imparting the necessary knowledge in the open light 
of day. 
Ten years ago, when Pasteur's researches had already brought 
untold blessings to France, and had shed their light over Great 
Britain and all other countries, the first public laboratory for bacterial 
research was just beginning to be established in England, at King's 
College, at the private expense of the professor who has presided over 
it ever since. True, Sir Joseph (now Lord) Lister had introduced the 
antiseptic methods of surgery which were the outcome of Pasteur's 
studies on the micro-organisms of the air, &c., but Lister, in carrying- 
out his early researches, had always to go abroad to obtain the neces- 
sary material. Meanwhile he had many disciples in this country who 
could neither afford to go abroad to study, nor find any school 
advanced enough in which to pursue the study at home. 
Accordingly it was literally underground I had to burrow, when I 
was taken to see the only laboratory in London doing useful, though 
limited, work a decade ago, and just before the completion of the 
present one at King's College. It was strange after visiting Pasteur's 
laboratory, with its many tributaries in and out of Paris, to descend 1897 
FRENCH & ENGLISH TREATMENT OF RESEARCH 
119 
into the humble basement of an ordinary private dwelling-house to 
find similar work going on there. There was a sense of secrecy in 
the atmosphere, as if the work intended for the good of humanity 
were conducted under the shadow of that dread persecution which so 
often stalks in the wake of ignorance, till the day of enlightenment 
comes. Above our heads was reared a noble pile of modern mansions, 
on every floor of which resided a family in peaceful unconsciousness 
of the arsenal of disease down below. It struck my feminine mind 
that the cook must have had a trying time of it, for I found that half 
of the kitchen, the whole of the scullery, and the entire pantry were 
given up to disease cultures in every stage of progress, while the 
wine-cellar, totally innocent of wine, made an excellent dark and 
heated culture chamber. Observing a dish of milk on the table, I 
inquired of my friend if that were meant for his own consumption. 
' Oh, no,' he casually remarked, ' that is sown with typhoid fever, and 
is under observation.' 
It may be consoling to the public to know that the only person 
who suffered at all from these dangers was the medical man himself, 
who lay for weeks very near unto death, a victim to his researches 
under difficulties. All this science in the wine-cellar has long since 
been given up, and the victim of enthusiasm is now in the fore- 
front of his profession, teaching others, and giving the benefit of his 
experience to innumerable patients who little know how his special 
knowledge and skill were acquired. Since then I have found him 
working in the laboratory at King's College, the first established in 
London for the teaching of students, and available for the investiga- 
tions of Lister and other men in surgical and medical practice. 
Since then the Royal Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons have 
opened a research laboratory at the Examination Hall, and every 
here and there laboratories have sprung up in connection with medical 
schools and universities, but rarely without objections on the part 
of the public being raised, and every obstacle to research being 
thrown in the way. Now let us consider what this antagonism 
means. It means that these are efforts in a right direction, and 
distinctly intended for the good of the human race, but owing to the 
opposition of the ignorant they prove so inadequate to the require- 
ments of the age, that we have to stand aside and allow other nations 
to do the work, while we either suffer the consequences, or reap the 
benefit, as the case may be. For instance, as to the benefits, we are 
distinctly a beer and spirit drinking nation, but outside scientific 
circles we are untroubled with the reflection that all the waste and 
difficulties we encountered in the manufacture of beer and spirits a 
few years ago have been entirely overcome owing to the laboratory 
researches of Pasteur. The beer no longer goes sour before it has 
matured, without our knowing the reason why. Its manufacture is 
no longer limited to the autumn, but can be continued throughout 120 
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
July 
the year. The result to the country is enormously increased reve- 
nues from this source, and as an indirect outcome the people are 
enjoying the advantages of free technical education, through the 
county councils, the funds for which, amounting to over 700,00(V. 
a year, are provided by the Government out of the surplus duty on 
beer and spirits. 
Again, we hear no more about the silkworm disease, which five- 
and-twenty years ago threatened to devastate the lands of the golden 
cocoon, until Pasteur was induced to take the matter up, and, after 
two years of arduous study, discovered the remedy now universally 
applied. But it never occurs to us to think why silk is so abundant 
and so cheap. 
Let our minds wander to those cruel battlefields which afflict us 
to think of, and the comforting thought comes to our relief that even 
the most severely wounded have now a chance of life they never had 
before. If we push our reflections a little further we shall find this 
is due to the knowledge of ' those lurking principles of death ' which 
has sprung from the laboratories of other nations. True, it was 
Lister who first grasped the principle and applied the remedy to 
surgery, but the knowledge of the living cause of disease originated 
abroad, and, as I have already said, was elaborated by Lister on foreign 
soil. 
When our Government officials, postmen and policemen, and 
people generally, are bitten by mad dogs, we thankfully send them 
to Paris to be inoculated with the anti-rabic virus at the expense of 
the Pasteur Institute. A fund at the Mansion House exists for this 
purpose, but we have never contributed as other nations have to the 
erection, endowment, or expenses of that great school. 
In Australia it was Pasteur's assistants who discovered the 
Cumberland disease to be the same as anthrax, and who have estab- 
lished the protective vaccine in that country. 
At this moment Yersin and Haffkine are succeeding in inoculating 
the people of our Indian Empire against the plague with their de- 
fensive serum, and Germany has sent a scientific commission, con- 
sisting of her most distinguished men, to Bombay to study the 
disease. Our illustrated papers, without the slightest jealousy, have 
depicted the group established in a well-appointed laboratory. 
To Pasteur we owe the inestimable knowledge of what a ferment 
means, not only within the brewer's vat, but within the blood and 
tissues of men and animals. What was dead to us before now lives, 
what was unseen is now visible, what was intangible can now be dealt 
with. The result is that these studies, having already conquered 
new worlds, open up vistas of endless worlds yet to conquer. But 
are we doomed to leave all these possible conquests to other nations 
for ever ? or has the time come when we can hope to join the great 
brotherhood, and work shoulder to shoulder in the cause of humanity ? 1897 
FRENCH & ENGLISH TREATMENT OF RESEARCH 
121 
Let us survey the land of our birth and see what our prospects 
are towards this scientific unity of nations. 
Through the energy of some of our leading men, what is known 
as the British School of Preventive Medicine was established in 
London a few years ago. People pass the door every day on their 
way to the British Museum, but there is nothing to distinguish it 
from the ordinary houses in the street. Yet within this very ordinary 
house lies that which has the power to save mothers from the life- 
long agony of seeing their children die of diphtheria, and also that 
which may save husbands from the misery of seeing their young 
wives sacrificed to certain forms of puerperal fever, while all the re- 
search is going on which is necessary to accomplish these ends. We 
are getting accustomed to hear of serums, and we shall soon take it as 
a matter of course that we can send round to the nearest chemist for 
a bottle of antitoxin for this complaint or that; but it is not within 
the power of the uninformed mind to conceive the nature of the 
work required to produce such remedies. 
In connection with this ordinary-looking house there is what the 
■director is pleased to call a ' farm ' a few miles out of town ; but the 
farm is a villa residence on the roadside, with a little paddock at 
the back where structures have been erected for the necessary horses, 
and the laboratory. In the first place it is interesting to observe 
that the farm is kept in the most perfect sanitary condition, and that 
the horses are all tested for glanders with an antitoxin called 
mallein, and for tuberculosis with tuberculin, before they are sub- 
jected to the treatment necessary to make them immune against 
other diseases. This testing, and the preparation of the tests, involve 
the most advanced 'scientific knowledge, and is what the French 
Government expects of us before sending the animals they have 
bought into France. In the farm laboratory, which is under the 
charge of Dr. Bullock and an assistant, you may see diphtheria grow- 
ing visibly before your eyes. In the flask containing it is a little 
soup, which was quite clear yesterday before it was inoculated with 
a trace of diphtheria culture taken from another flask. Now it is 
clouded, and on the surface a morbid growth is settling, painfully 
resembling the growth that may be seen in the throat of a patient 
suffering from that cruel disease. This particular specimen of the 
diphtheria bacillus had gone through hundreds of generations, passing 
from flask to flask, without losing any of its virulence. Two years 
before it had been taken from the throat of a child in Norway, sent 
to the Pasteur Institute, and from there passed on to us. The culture 
is grown for seven or ten days in the flask at a temperature of 37° C. 
It is then filtered through a Chamberland filter and its strength 
tested. 
The horses, which are well fed and kept in excellent condition, 
are now inoculated with small and gradually 'ncreasing doses of this 122 
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 
July 
active diphtheria poison, until they are rendered perfectly immune. 
During this process they seem more bent on the bits of sugar they 
are getting than disturbed by the prick of the syringe. At first the 
temperature slightly rises, but after twenty-four hours all symptoms 
are gone. After three, four, or five months the maximum anti- 
toxicity is reached. A little of the blood of the horse is now drawn 
into a glass flagon, carefully protected from the possibility of inimical 
germs reaching it. The red constituents of the blood fall to the 
bottom of the flagon, leaving a clear fluid above; this is the anti-toxic 
serum, the antidote for the poison. But it is not completed yet, 
for it has to be tested to see that its value comes up to the standard 
which has been established by the German Government. This done, 
a number of very small blue bottles are withdrawn from the sterilis- 
ing chamber and filled with the precious fluid, every bottle being 
labelled and marked with the strength of the dose. They are then 
forwarded to the laboratory in Great Russell Street, and are ready 
for the hospitals and for use in private practice. 
This work is of such paramount importance that all the scientific 
men engaged in it are agreed as to the necessity for Government 
jurisdiction in the preparation of serums. That coming to our 
country from some quarters is frequently found to be below the 
accepted standard, hence likely to fail at the critical moment. 
The method I have just described applies equally to the tetanus 
serum, only the process is slower, owing to the horse being more 
susceptible to this disease. 
To prepare an antitoxin for the treatment of septic diseases, living 
cultures of the micro-organism known as the Streptococcus pyogenes 
are used. The maximum of virulence is obtained by passage from 
rabbit to rabbit, and the seram is used for erysipelas, some forms of 
puerperal fever, blood poisoning, &c. Both in France and in this 
country good results have followed the treatment in puerperal 
fever. 
Thanks to the goodwill of a humane individual, Mr. Berridge by 
name, who left a large sum of money to be devoted to the spread of 
sanitary knowledge, a portion of this benefaction has afforded the 
means for carrying out this work for the last few years, in a small 
way, pending the erection of a more suitable building. A site for 
this has been found on the Thames Embankment, and there the 
structure may now be seen. It is proposed that this should be a 
school of hygiene as well as a school of preventive medicine, but it is 
not considered either desirable or necessary to carry on anti-rabic 
inoculations here, owing to the easy proximity of Paris. People, 
however, would be able to have the question definitely decided in 
this laboratory as to whether the dog was really mad that bit them. 
This is a point at once affecting the happiness and the purse of those 
who are bitten. It is known that ' dogs suffer from symptoms simu- 1897 
FRENCH & ENGLISH TREATMENT OF RESEARCH 
123 
lating those of rabies; and formerly, when human beings were 
bitten, it was impossible in some cases to determine whether the dog- 
had been suffering from rabies or not. We are indebted to Pasteur 
for the only trustworthy test which can be applied ; and we are now 
in a position, when a human being is bitten by a dog supposed to be, 
but not really, rabid, to remove all cause for anxiety, which would 
otherwise remain for months or even years.' 1 All that is required 
is to have the dog killed and the head sent to the research laboratory, 
where a rabbit would at once be inoculated with a portion of the 
brain. The death or life of the rabbit in a few days would settle the 
question of going over to Paris for the anti-rabic treatment or resting 
in peace at home. With a test laboratory in India many of the 
people now sent on to Paris in anxiety and haste might be spared a 
long and costly journey. Again, instead of our Government vaccine 
station occupying the ground floor of a poor house, in a poor street, it 
would be better to annex it to this new School of Preventive Medicine, 
with a suitable subsidy from the Government. Here also questions 
affecting not only the health of human beings and animals, but the 
industrial and agricultural prosperity of the people, will be scientifi- 
cally studied, and brought to a practical conclusion. It further holds 
out a prospect that animals intended for breeding purposes in our 
own and other countries may be tested at home, and this with serums 
or vaccines sent forth from our own central laboratory made by the 
experts of our own country. If this can only be done in a large 
national way, and certificates of health after testing could ensure 
sound meat at the market-place, and wholesome milk in our homes, 
the boon to the community would be quite as great as vaccination 
against smallpox is at present. It is due to the Berridge fund that 
a start has now been made, and it is hoped that enlightened 
public opinion will enable it to go on. 
At the end of the nineteenth century it is deplorable to think 
that as a nation we are still much in the same position with regard 
to this branch of science as that in which Sir Isaac Newton found 
himself when he said, ' I have been but a child playing on the sea- 
shore, now finding some pebble rather more agreeably variegated 
than another, while the immense ocean of Truth extends itself 
unexplored before me.' 
Eliza Priestley. 
1 Crookshank's Bacteriology.