310 THE WONDERFUL CENTURY. CHAP. xvm. 



shown by the dotted line), and was accompanied by an 

 increase of all these mortalities. But, so soon as the re- 

 volt against vaccination began, till the present time when 

 it has diminished to about 2 or 3 per cent, of births, all 

 mortalities have steadily decreased, and that decrease has 

 been especially marked in infant lives. It is very sug- 

 gestive that the lines of infant mortality have now 

 reached the position they would have had if the slow de- 

 crease during 1850-60 had been continued, strongly in- 

 dicating that some special cause sent them up, and the 

 removal of that cause allowed them to sink again; and 

 during that very period vaccination increased and then 

 steadily "decreased. I venture to declare that in the 

 whole history of vaccination there is no such clear and 

 satisfactory proof of its having saved a single life as 

 these Leicester statistics afford of its having been the 

 cause of death to many hundreds of infants. 



Diagram X. exhibits the check to the decrease in in- 

 fant mortality, both in London and for England, since 

 the enforcement of vaccination (p. 257), and thus sup- 

 ports and enforces the conclusions derived from the pre- 

 ceding diagram. 



I next discuss in some detail what is undoubtedly the 

 most complete and crucial test of the value or uselessness 

 of vaccination to be found anywhere in the world. 

 Since 1860 in the Army, and 1872 in the Navy, every 

 man without exception, English or foreign, has been vac- 

 cinated on entering the service, though for long before 

 that period practically the whole force was vaccinated or 

 revaccinated. Diagrams XI. and XII. exhibit the re- 

 sult of the statistics presented to the Commission, show- 



