DEVELOPMENT IN NINETEENTH CENTURY 315 



That was an historic scene, fraught with inestimable value to 

 mankind. Here were three noble men, brave heroes, every one of 

 them, experimenting at the conscious risk of their own lives, with 

 a vapor respecting whose fatal qualities they knew not, in the hope 

 of discovering a way by which poor suffering humanity might be 

 spared from pain. They took the chance of sacrificing their own 

 lives if necessary, for the good of mankind. Such acts of patient 

 research, weary waiting, unselfishness, bravery, and heroism belong 

 only to a profession in which saving of human life at the risk of 

 losing one's own life is undertaken. 



It appears that Simpson's mind had long worked on the great and 

 perplexing problem. His daughter tells us that "very early in his 

 student days he had so sickened at the suffering he witnessed in the 

 operating-theater that he had shrunk from the scene, decided to 

 abandon his medical studies and seek his way in the paths of law." 

 This, however, he did not do. On the contrary he resolved "to fight 

 a good fight " in the field upon which he had already entered, and he 

 did, getting to himself an undying fame thereby, and conferring 

 an immeasurable benefit upon mankind to the end of time. 



Before leaving this part of our subject, it seems pertinent to call 

 the attention of the enemies of vivisection to the splendid heroism 

 and unselfishness which Wells, Morton, and Simpson displayed in 

 making these hazardous experiments upon themselves, and not upon 

 lower animals. This world would be far better off if these enemies 

 to the true progress of surgery would take this noble object-lesson 

 to heart, and cease their senseless tirade against vivisection, which 

 has been as absolutely accessory to science as its benefits have been 

 great. The only object and aim of vivisection is to save man from 

 suffering, misery, and death. Shakespeare's thought that "it is 

 sometimes necessary to be cruel in order to be kind" is true in this 

 connection. 



The topic of anesthesia must not be dismissed without a reference 

 to Keller's discovery of local anesthesia by cocain, especially in 

 ophthalmic surgery. The use of the spinal canal for medication, of 

 which the injection of cocain for anesthesia is one of the adminis- 

 trations in vogue, was suggested by Corning in 1884. This particular 

 form and method of anesthesia has been a contribution to surgery 

 within the past quarter of a century, and has met the needs of a class 

 of cases to which general anesthesia could not be applied. 



As to the mortality of anesthetics, Poncet concludes that chloro- 

 form is more dangerous than ether, since Juillard's and Gurlt's 

 statistics show one death in from 2000 to 3000 administrations of 

 chloroform, and one death in from 13,000 to 14,000 of ether, while 

 in nitrous oxid gas there are practically no deaths. 



The influence of the introduction of anesthetics upon the progress 



