227

Let anyone take the map of the city and draw a perpendicularline through the centre ; intersect this line at right angles,and out of the four segments thus formed the outbreak hasbeen almost totally confined to one segment of the four.Sporadic cases have occurred in the other three or some ofthem, but this does not constitute a small-pox epidemic inBath, although it is an epidemic respecting the unfortunatedistrict affected. Of the eighty cases of small-pox reportedseventy-four were removed-fifty-three to the Union andtwenty-one to the Statutory Hospital. In every instancethe removal of the case has been immediately followed bydisinfection of rooms and all articles of bed-clothing andbody-clothing." "

____________

DR. FARR.

AT a meeting of the Sheffield Medico-Chirurgical Society,held on Jan. 29th, Mr. Arthur Jackson, President, in thechair, the following resolution was unanimously adopted :-"That the members of the Sheffield Medico-Chirurgical

Society desire to express their high sense of the great serviceswhich Dr. Wm. Farr has rendered to his country in promotingsanitary progress, and to record their deep regret that hisparamount claims to the Registrar-Generalship have beenoverlooked by the present Government, and to hope thatthose services will shortly be recompensed in a suitablemanner by that Government."Copies were directed to be sent to Lord Beaconsfield and

Mr. Sclater-Booth.

Correspondence.VACCINE LYMPH.

"Audi alteram partem."

To the Editor of THE LANCET.SlR,—Dr. Cameron is anxious to avoid the charge of dog-

matism ; but so long as he arrogantly asserts opinionsopposed to facts he cannot escape the imputation. Heasserted in The Times of November 21th, 189, that thelymph obtained by the inoculation of the cow with small-pox virus was the source of the dissemination of small-pox-was, in fact, inoculated small-pox. Notwithstanding (asyou justly observe) "the large amount of the lymph thusobtained and used in this country, he has not produced oneparticle of evidence to show that in any single instancesmall-pox was even ever suspected to have been producedby infection from a case of so-called variola vaccine. Thedilemma he now sees is insuperable, and he proceeds tourge, in effect, that this modified small-pox has lost its in-fective qualities, and that, if not dangerous as inoculatedsmall-pox, it has become useless as a protection against thenatural disease ! He discards his first line of argument asto the mischievousness of this variola vaccine lymph in dis-seminating contagion, and substitutes another sort of argu-ment which is equally against all experience."

" Like Gold-smith’s schoolmaster, "even though vanquished, he can arguestill." Had Dr. Cameron, before making such rash and reck-less assertions, made inquiries at home, he would not havefallen into the dilemma in which he now finds himself. Hewould have discovered that my experiments in inoculatingthe cow with human variolous virus were not made for thepurpose of obtaining a new lymph, but in the endeavourto solve a doubt long entertained of the affinity of vacciniaand variola, that after fruitless attempts to infect the cowsby the method of Sonderhuid and Neumann, and amidstseveral failures to inoculate such animals with small-pox, Iat length succeeded in obtaining vesicles bearing all thecharacteristics of those which I had repeatedly seen on thecow casually developed ; that these experiments were per-formed in the presence of members of the veterinary andmedical professions, and watched during their progress and inall their phases and effects on the human subject, corres-ponding with those resulting from active primary vaccine,to which none of them were strangers, and were unattended

at any time by abnormal or varioloid eruptions. He wouldalso have known that the lymph was for t long time underobservation at Cheltenham, where it was extensively used ;that for many months it was in use at the Small-pox andVaccination Hospital under the observation of Dr. Gregoryand Mr. Marson, and at the Cow-pox Institution in Dublin,and by numerous private practitioners in all parts of thekingdom. I also forwarded supplies of the lymph to theEast and West Indies, to Africa, and many other places athome and abroad, all agreeing that it proved to be an activegenuine vaccine lymph, unattended by any abnormal erup-tions or any approach to variola.The details of all the proceedings on the animals and on

man, with numerous illustrations, 1 was permitted to placein the eighth and tenth volumes of the Provincial Medicaland Surgical Association’s Transactions, and they, withdescriptions and illustrations of other allied subjects, havereceived critical and favourable notices by highly qualifiedcritics.

But, after all, I am happy to add that I am but oneamong the many successful operators in the above experi-ments. The success of my predecessors was unknown tome till after the publication of my own. The most dis-tinguished of my successors is Mr. John Badcock, ofBrighton, who, unacquainted with my experiments, com-menced with the desire to obtain a new stock of vaccinelymph, I think in the year 1840. He, having the advantageof a succession of milch cows in his dairy, has obtainedrepeated supplies of new lymph, during a period of manyyears. I have had the pleasure at various times of usinghis lymph, and always found it possessed of the qualities ofmy own. It was for several years in use by the late Mr.Marson at the Small-pox and Vaccination Hospital, and hasbeen repeatedly transmitted to all parts of the world withthe best cilects. A stock generated twenty years ago isstill in use at Brighton by the public vaccinators and manyprivate practitioners, with undiminished power, and elicitingthe recognition and unqualified appreciation of those mostcompetent to judge.

It is to be hoped now that Dr. Cameron will see what hehas lost bv inattention to the advice of Cicero to his in-quiring friends : "Meos amicos in quibus est studium,jubeo ut a fontibus potius quam rivulos consectentur."

I remain, Sir, yours truly,

I Aylesbury, Jan. 2Sth, 1880. ROBERT CEELY.ROBERT CEELY.

ACUTE RHEUMATISM.To the Editor of THE LANCET.

Sin,—Having read in THE LAKCET for Jan. 17th anaccount of the discussion on acute rheumatism at theClinical Society’s meeting, and ci propos of the very inter-

. esting remarks of Dr. Goodhart, I send you the particulars: of a fatal case which has just occurred in my practice, and

which was treated by means of the salicylate of soda.On Dec. 31st I was called to see A. R-, aged twenty-

six, of an excitable and irritable temperament, with a

history of asthma, but otherwise healthy. He complainedto me of stiffness of the joints, pain about the shoulders and

: back, shivering, vomiting, &c., and he attributed thesesymptoms to exposure to wet and cold. I ordered him tobed, and next day diagnosed rheumatic fever. I need nottake up space with the symptoms of the case, as it appeareda typical one, and uncomplicated. Sleeplessness and rest-lessness were prominent symptoms. I attended him fornine days. During the first four days he was placed on thealkaline treatment, and the joints, which were all affected,were fomented with anodynes, carefully blistered, and wellwrapped in cotton-wadding. The skin and kidneys actedfreely, and the bowels once or twice daily. As he continuedto sufler great pain, so much so that he expressed a wish todie, and to have, despite the free use of opiates and chloral,very restless, sleepless nights, with some delirium, 1 de-termined to try the salicylic acid treatment, which I hadbeen successful with, particularly, in a case of acute rheu-matism complicating convalescence from enteric fever. Iplaced him on fifteen grains of the salicylate of soda, inglycerine and water, every three hours. Improvement com-menced very quickly, and in two days’ time he delightedhis friends by exhibiting how easily he could move his legsin bed, and how nimble his fingers were. He complainedof a little numbness in his hands, but was entirely free from