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THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



their lives saved, or (2) will you insist 

 that not a single guinea pig, rabbit, or 

 rat shall suffer the slightest pain or 

 lose its life, in researches to lessen the 

 suffering and save the lives of our sol- 

 diers ? 



Eemeniber, if you choose the second 

 you deliberately condemn your son, 

 brother, or husband to sufferings far 

 beyond any suffering of these animals. 

 In many cases, as I shall show, you will 

 condemn your dear one to death, and in 

 some cases a horribly painful death. 



In the "Bill of Complaint" of the 

 antivivisectionists, seven grounds of 

 opposition to vivisection are mentioned. 

 The sixth reads as follows: 



"That altliough it [vivisection] has been 

 jji-actised for many years, nothing has been 

 discovered by means of it that is at all bene- 

 ficial to the human race." 



This is the crux of the wliole matter. 

 If this were true I would vigorously op- 

 jiose vivisection myself. 



I entered upon my medical studies in 

 1860. I took part in the horrible sur- 

 gery of the Civil War— as we now know 

 it was. I have taught anatomy and 

 surgery to not far from 10.000 students. 

 I taught and practised the old dirty 

 surgery — the only kind we then had — 

 up to October 1, 1876. Since that date 

 I have practised and taught the new 

 antiseptic surgery, which has been cre- 

 ated by researches similar to those now 

 proposed. Since the Great War began I 

 have diligently studied the newest sur- 

 gery. I submit, therefore, that I may 

 be presumed to be fairly familiar with 

 these three stages of surgery. Let me 

 give now a few examples of some of the 

 things that have "been discovered by it 

 [vivisectionj'" and that are "beneficial 

 to the human race." 



I may remark in passing that ani- 

 mals themselves have benefited by the 

 same means, almost, and possibly quite 

 as much as the human race. 



1. Typhoid Fever. — This has been 

 one of the historic scourges of armies. 



In 1880 the bacillus — the cause of the 

 fever — was discovered. It was soon 

 proved that the disease was spread 

 through infected milk, infected water, 

 and very largely by the house fly. The 

 last, after walking over the excrement 

 of a typhoid patient, and then walk- 

 ing over our food, conveys the disease. 

 Prevention of contamination by these 

 three means— sanitary measures based 

 on the discoveries of bacteriology — pre- 

 vents the disease to a large extent. But 

 our real triumph over the disease was 

 not achieved until lately. 



I may here call attention to the fact 

 that the antivivisectionists entirely re- 

 ject bacteriology, a science which has 

 disclosed to us the causes of many dis- 

 eases, and has enabled us to prepare 

 antitoxins to neutralize the poisons de- 

 veloped by these bacteria. Without bac- 

 teriology the physician and the surgeon 

 today would be as helpless as a mariner 

 without a compass. 



Cases Deaths 



During the Civil War ty- 

 phoid fever resulted in. 79,462 and 29,330 

 In the Boer War there 



were 58,000 " 8,000 



(In that war the total 



number of deaths was 



22,000. Typhoid alone, 



therefore, was respon- 

 sible for more than one 



third of all the deaths ! ) 

 In our war with Spain 



there were 20,738 " 1,580 



Our Army numbered 



107,973 men. Therefore 



every fifth soldier fell 



ill with' typhoid in 1898 ! 



Over 86 per cent of all 



deaths in this war were 



due to typhoid ! ! 



During the Boer War imperfect at- 

 tempts were made to control typhoid by 

 an antitoxin similar to that against 

 diphtheria, which has saved such mul- 

 titudes of children. Gradually the 

 method has been improved so that in 

 our army it was at first recommended 

 as a voluntary protection (1909). The 



