INTRODUCTION. 



II 



undergo the operation; and the French ambassador says pleas- 

 antly that they take the small-pox here by way of diversion, as 

 they take the waters in other countries." The mild attacks 

 that followed inoculation were, however, just as contagious to 

 other persons as the natural disease, so that the dangers of this 

 practice to the community were very great. 



This was previous to the introducion of vaccination by 

 Edward Jenner in 1796. At this time a belief was current 

 among farmers that a mild form of disease, called cow-pox, 

 acquired by milkers, furnished protection against small-pox, 

 and on investigation Jenner found this belief to be justified. 

 In a few years the practice of vaccination spread to all parts 

 of the world.* 



It was introduced into the United States by Dr. Benjamin 

 Waterhouse, of Harvard. President Thomas Jefferson was 

 active in bringing it into general use, especially in the South. 



The infectious nature of puerperal fever was first demon- 

 strated by Semmelweis, of Vienna, in 1847. Before this time 

 unsuccessful attempts had been made to prove that atmospheric 

 influences were responsible for the disease, and during the 

 seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the course had been 

 supposed to lie in the absorption of the milk from the breasts 

 into the blood. But Semmelweis was struck by the, similarity 

 between puerperal fever and a fatal case of pyemia following a 

 dissecting wound in the case of a friend of his, and was led by 

 this observation to attribute the origin of the disease to poisons 

 carried on the fingers of physicians and students from the 

 dissecting-room to the woman in childbed. This idea of 

 Semmelweis aroused opposition and ridicule, but it withstood 

 these tests though the originator somewhat modified his 

 views. As a prophylactic measure, Semmelweis advocated 



*See the works of Edward Jenner by Dock. New York Medical Journal 

 Nov. 29 and Dec. 6, 1902. Also Dulles. The History of Vaccination. Phila 

 delphia Medical Journal. May 30, 1903. 



