ESSAY-REVIEWS 79 



library of the Surgeon-General's office, then a mere handful of 

 books compared with the vast collection of the present day ; 

 but enough to start him on his gigantic development of medical 

 bibliography. Simultaneously he was called upon to inspect 

 and report on marine hospital service throughout the country. 

 This necessitated personal visits of inspection to all the ports 

 of the country. He found the service in a disorganised 

 condition, but he re-established it upon a military basis till it 

 gradually reached its present high stage of efficiency. 



Billings made two important contributions to military 

 medicine between 1870 and 1875. The first was the report to 

 the Surgeon on Barracks and Hospitals, and the second on 

 the Hygiene of the United States Army. The report on 

 Barracks and Hospitals was the joint work of several army 

 officers, edited by himself, containing a sweeping criticism 

 from his own pen of the hospital management and construc- 

 tion then in existence, quoting Tenon's report made to the 

 French Academy of Sciences in 1788 as a model for future 

 scientific hospital construction, and making his own sugges- 

 tions for reform in this direction. His recommendations were 

 to bear fruit in subsequent years in a most remarkable fashion 

 in his connection with the Johns Hopkins Hospital. The report 

 on Hygiene in the United States Army strongly insisted 

 upon the care of the soldier as a unit, by the encouragement of 

 personal cleanliness and the ventilation of his surroundings. 



In 1897 Billings was appointed Vice-Chairman of the 

 National Board of Health, a body which, though comparatively 

 short-lived, did good work, much of which was at his instiga- 

 tion and under his guidance. 



The Centenary of American Independence let loose a 

 flood of self-congratulatory reminiscences on the part of 

 Americans generally. Billings's centennial survey of the litera- 

 ture of his profession in A Century of American Medicine, 

 1 776-1 876, stood out in sharp contrast to the smooth sayings 

 of others. The writings of the colonial period he entirely 

 discounts, and he is severely critical of the whole output to 

 date. This established his reputation as a medical historian 

 in the eyes of the more enlightened members of his profession 

 abroad, though not, it is to be feared, among his confreres in 

 the United States. 



Memphis, one of the centres of cotton distribution in the 



