320 HENRY INGERSOLL BOWDITCH. 



or creed. When his fame was at its zenith, probably even his own 

 family did not learn, when his quick eye of sympathy had seen so 

 many ways to help, that after a long day's work he had given away 

 far more than the amount of his fees, so little did his right hand 

 know what his left hand was doing. He gave himself freely and 

 gladly with his gift. How many soldiers' widows went from his 

 office without being allowed to pay any fee for his advice ! It is true 

 that his generosity was imposed upon, but his almost instinctive rec- 

 ognition of what was base, and his contempt for it, often saved him 

 from impostors. 



To his professional associates he was an inspiration ; to the younger 

 men his unfailing kindness of heart and generosity gave strength and 

 courage ; the example of his life raised them to a higher plane of 

 living. To one who had sought advice from many older physicians, 

 and had heard how to get practice and fame and wealth. Dr. Bow- 

 ditch's words were : " Never do anything which will make you think 

 afterwards that you have been a sneak." 



Even before the surgeons, in 1850, he successfully operated for em- 

 pyema, and in later years he fairly lost patience with them for being 

 so slow to take up laparotomy for abdominal and pelvic tumors and 

 abscesses. To one surgeon whom he considered one of the boldest, 

 but who was not willing to open a perinephritic abscess, he proposed, 

 in 1871, himself to push in the scalpel where the surgeon pointed out 

 the proper spot. In sanitary science, too, he led the way. With the 

 eloquence of sincerity, showing to a committee of the Legislature his 

 chart indicating the prevalence of pulmonary consumption in Massa- 

 chusetts, he explained to them the law which he discovered of its 

 relation to soil moisture, giving them in detail the results of his pains- 

 taking investigations upon the relation of soil moisture to pulmonary 

 consumption, as embodied in the annual address to the Massachusetts 

 Medical Society, which he delivered in 1862. In indicating to the 

 Legislature how much could be and had been done, by regarding this 

 law, to save human life, he chiefly persuaded them to create the first 

 State Board of Health in this country, an example which thirty 

 States have followed. When the board was appointed, in 1809, Dr. 

 Bowditch was easily first in the estimation of the medical profession 

 and the community for the arduous and responsible duties of its Presi- 

 dent, a position which he retained, at great sacrifice of his time and 

 professional income, until 1879. When the powerful interests attacked 

 by the board in the cause of the public health resisted, and the poli- 

 ticians threatened, and other members of the board hesitated, ardent 



