13() SMALL-roX IN SIIKKP. 



was already familiar to those most learned in medicine 

 and natural history ; and no man of science could deny 

 the correctness of his experiments, or the justness of his 

 conclusions. A great fermentation instantly arose ; and 

 the subject was hotly discussed, both in professional 

 circles and in general society. Many of the sanguine, 

 and a few of the profound, were at once convinced of 

 the tiuth of Jenner's opinions : but the cautious sus- 

 pended their judgment, while the superficial and self- 

 sufficient pronounced at once that the whole was an 

 absurdity. 



" The faithfulness of Jenner's statements could only 

 be ascertained by further experiments, and the honour 

 of commencing them is due to Mr. Cline*." This sur- 

 jreon havincf at that time under his care, at St. Thomas's 

 Hospital, a child affected with a disease of the hip joint, 

 w^hich he feared would be aggravated by an attack of 

 small-pox, resolved to try vaccination. " He made a 

 slight scratch on the skin of the hip with the point of a 

 lancet, and held for a minute in the wound a quill 

 charged with vaccine lymph, which he had received 

 from Dr. Jenner. A vesicle in all points similar to his 

 description arose ; the child sickened on the seventh 

 day, and the febrile affection subsided on the eleventh. 



" Mr. Chne next inoculated the child with small- 

 pox matter in three places. These punctures inflamed 

 sliiihtlv on the third day, and then healed ; and the 

 child resisted completely the variolous contagionf ." 



We cannot better shew the great capabihty of 

 the vaccine disease to check the spread of small-pox, 



* Plurabe on Vaccination, p. 27 & seq. 

 t Ibid., p. -29 & seq. 



