Biology and Medicine 441 



own ! We are so accustomed to things as they are, that only 

 the historian thinks of things as they have been, while the 

 constructive prophet is as rare among us as the proverbial 

 hen's teeth. How often do we go back in memory to the 

 days of the market basket, when the telephone was not at 

 hand to bring our dinners to our doors, or the coal oil lamp, 

 and the gas lamp post; while the days of the horse car and 

 horse carriage, will soon be classified as the "age of horses," 

 not clearly distinguishable in our minds from the "age of 

 reptiles," "Amphibia" or "fishes." It may not then be 

 amiss to contrast for a moment some pictures of the past 

 and present in medicine and public health. 



At the time of the great smallpox epidemic in 1752 Boston 

 had a population of 15,684, of whom 5,998 had had the disease, 

 leaving 9,686 persons who were susceptible to it. Of these 

 7,669 contracted the disease, 5,545 by contact and 2,124 by 

 inoculation (in order to produce a mild type of the disease 

 and escape its danger) and 1,843 persons left the city, leav- 

 ing but 174 who, without the immunity furnished by 

 a previous attack, faced the disease, but were not stricken. 

 The history of smallpox in the cities of Europe in pre- 

 vaccination days is one long record of despair and death. 

 In America the disease introduced by the early explorers 

 swept like wild-fire among the natives who proved pecu- 

 liarly susceptible to it, carrying away, according to early 

 historians, whole tribes, and reducing others to mere rem- 

 nants of their former selves. One of these writers (Catlin) 

 gives it as his opinion that at least one-half of the Indians 

 of North America were taken by smallpox. Quoting from 

 Parker he says of the Indians below the Falls of the Columbia 

 that at least seven-eighths, if not nine-tenths, were destroyed 

 by smallpox between 1829 and 1836. Prior to the advent 

 of the United States in the Philippines there were more 

 than 6,000 deaths in seven provinces annually from small- 

 pox. 



Turning now to the other side of the picture we find a 

 conspicuous decrease in smallpox after the introduction of 

 vaccination, while in countries where vaccination is com- 

 pulsory, the disease scarcely exists. In 1905 and 1906, 

 3,094,635 vaccinations were performed by the U. S. Bureau 

 of Health in the Philippine Islands. In the report of the 

 director (Doctor Victor G. Heiser) of 1907, he says: "In the 

 provinces of Cavite, Batangas, Cebu, Bataan, La Union, Rizal 

 and La Laguna, where heretofore there have been more than 

 6,000 deaths annually from smallpox, it is satisfactory to 

 report, since the completion of vaccination in the afore- 



