268 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ness of the conclusions of the American commission. It has been well 

 said that Keed's experiments 'will always remain as models in the 

 annals of scientific research, both for the exactness with which they 

 were adapted to the points to be proved and the precautions taken that 

 no experiment should be vitiated by failure to exclude all possible 

 sources of error. ' 



Appreciation of Eeed's work was instant in the scientific world. 

 Honorary degrees from Harvard University and the University of 

 Michigan were conferred upon him, learned societies and distinguished 

 men delighted to honor him, and after his death congress voted a 

 special pension to his widow. 



To the United States the value of his services can not be estimated. 

 Ninety times has yellow fever invaded the country, carrying death and 

 destruction, leaving poverty and grief. New Orleans, Memphis, 

 Charleston, Galveston, Portsmouth, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New 

 York and many smaller towns have been swept by the disease. The 

 epidemic of 1853 cost New Orleans eight thousand lives, that of 1793 

 wiped out ten per cent, of Philadelphia's population. The financial 

 loss to the United States in the one epidemic of 1878 was estimated 

 as amounting to fifteen million three hundred and thirty-five thousand 

 dollars; but suffering, panic, fear and the tears of widows and orphans 

 can never be estimated. Now, however, if yellow fever should again 

 cross our southern border, there need be no disturbance of commerce or 

 loss of property in the slightest degree comparable with that which 

 epidemics in the past have caused. 



The death of Major Reed took place November 23, 1902, in Wash- 

 ington, from appendicitis. It is gratifying to think that, although his 

 country and the scientific world were deprived of one from whose future 

 services more benefit to humanity might reasonably be expected, never- 

 theless he was privileged before his life's close to know that his dis- 

 covery had been tested, and that a great city was freed from her ancient 

 foe, to know that his conscientious work had contributed immeasurably 

 toward the future prospects of an infant republic, and even more to 

 the welfare of his own beloved country, whose flag he had served so 

 faithfully. 



In the national capital and in the great cities of the United States 

 there are stately monuments to the country's great ones. Statues of 

 warriors, statesmen and patriots stand as silent witnesses of a people's 

 gratitude. Is there not room for the effigy of Walter Reed, who so 

 clearly pointed out to his fellow man tbc way to conquer America's 

 worst plague? 



