A HISTORY OF SCIENCE 



discovery. Hence it is clear that Jackson's claim to 

 equal share with Morton in the discovery was unwar- 

 ranted, not to say absurd. 



Dr. Long's association with the matter was far differ- 

 ent and altogether honorable. By one of those coin- 

 cidences so common in the history of discovery, he was 

 experimenting with ether as a pain-destroyer simulta- 

 neously with Morton, though neither so much as knew 

 of the existence of the other. While a medical student 

 he had once inhaled ether for the intoxicant effects, as 

 other medical students were wont to do, and when par- 

 tially under influence of the drug he had noticed that a 

 chance blow to his shins was painless. This gave him 

 the idea that ether might be used in surgical operations ; 

 and in subsequent years, in the course of his practice in 

 a small Georgia town, he put the idea into successful 

 execution. There appears to be no doubt whatever 

 that he performed successful minor operations under 

 ether some two or three years before Morton's final 

 demonstration; hence that the merit of first using the 

 drug, or indeed any drug, in this way belongs to him. 

 But, unfortunately, Dr. Long did not quite trust the 

 evidence of his own experiments. Just at that time 

 the medical journals were full of accounts of experi- 

 ments in which painless operations were said to be per- 

 formed through practice of hypnotism, and Dr. Long 

 feared that his own success might be due to an inci- 

 dental hypnotic influence rather than to the drug. 

 Hence he delayed announcing his apparent discovery 

 until he should have opportunity for further tests 

 and opportunities did not come every day to the coun- 

 try practitioner. And vvhile he waited, Morton antici- 



216 



