FIELD NATURALISTS' CLUB. 117 



Asylum. They are eight in number, and every one of them fur- 

 nishes the strongest internal evidence of downright, hard, earnest, 

 intelligently-directed work. Not only did Dr. Rake make experi- 

 ments himself, but he gave a fair trial to the experiments of others 

 in the treatment of his patients. All through his reports one 

 can see that the sole object of all he did was to 

 arrive at the truth, and in order to arrive at that goal 

 a readiness to give up any and every theory or opinion he 

 had previously formed directly he himself, or what is perhaps 

 harder in such cases, any one else proved that it was untenable. 

 As one reads these reports one cannot help being struck with 

 his indomitable zeal in the search after knowledge, in 

 the face of the greatest difficulties and with a total forgetful- 

 ness of self, a singleness of purpose, a great, noble, 

 ardent desire to arrive at some method, to devise some 

 treatment by which the fearful disease of leprosy 

 might be extirpated, and failing that, methods by which, if 

 absolute cure was impossible, its ravages might be retarded, and 

 the pain and anguish of the unfortunate sufferers alleviated. 

 To the lay mind the reports are interesting but not pleasant 

 reading, for they open a new vista of human suffering, of 

 heroic well-directed efforts to aid and to succour, backed up 

 by the life-long martyrdom of the saintly ladies who carry 

 out so unhesitatingly the treatment prescribed. 



Turning to the first report, (February 1885) we find that 

 Dr. Rake, after describing the results of the use of Gurjun and 

 Chaulmoogra Oils, says : " The general health and nutrition of 

 " lepers improves so decidedly in most cases under careful diet 

 " and nursing, that it is difficult to form an opinion as to the 

 value of any medicine." He then describes the effects of arsenic 

 in two cases, in one of which the results were a great improve- 

 ment in health, while the other experienced benefit from the 

 treatment. A number of amputations and operations are then 

 described with a detail which show the earnestness with which the 

 new Superintendent had commenced his life-work. His next report, 

 which, with tabular statements, covers 35 pages, deals with the 

 distribution of bacilli, and he draws attention to the fact that 

 seventeen observations on material taken from vaccine vesicles 

 or pustules in lepers failed to show any bacilli in any of them, 

 and he adds : " A point of interest with reference to the alleged 

 " communication of leprosy by vaccination, though, as willbeshown 

 " later, I am not yet prepared to accept the leprosy bacillus as 

 " pathogenic." Then, after describing the method adopted to 

 find the bacillus — a modification of Ehrlich's — magenta without 

 a contrast stain — he says errors of experiments are so easily 

 made that one series of observation is not enough to decide the 

 point. He then goes on "If bacilli are as common in the 



