178 EDWARD JENNER 



of cow-pox slept in a bed, while the experiment was going 

 forward, with two children who never had gone through 

 either that disease or the smallpox, without infecting either 

 of them. 



A young woman who had the cow-pox to a great extent, 

 several sores which maturated having appeared on the hands 

 and wrists, slept in the same bed with a fellow-dairymaid 

 who never had been infected with either the cow-pox or the 

 smallpox, but no indisposition followed. 



Another instance has occurred of a young woman on whose 

 hands were several large suppurations from the cow-pox, 

 who was at the same time a daily nurse to an infant, but the 

 complaint was not communicated to the child. 



In some other points of view the inoculation of this disease 

 appears preferable to the variolous inoculation. 



In constitutions predisposed to scrophula, how frequently 

 we see the inoculated smallpox rouse into activity that dis- 

 tressful malady ! This circumstance does not seem to de- 

 pend on the manner in which the distemper has shewn it- 

 self, for it has as frequently happened among those who have 

 had it mildly as when it has appeared in the contrary way. 



There are many who, from some peculiarity in the habit, re- 

 sist the common effects of variolous matter inserted into the 

 skin, and who are in consequence haunted through life with 

 the distressing idea of being insecure from subsequent in- 

 fection. A ready mode of dissipating anxiety originating 

 from such a cause must now appear obvious. And, as we 

 have seen that the constitution may at any time be made to 

 feel the febrile attack of cow-pox, might it not, in many 

 chronic diseases, be introduced into the system, with the 

 probability of affording relief, upon well-known physiological 

 principles ? 



Although I say the system may at any time be made to 

 feel the febrile attack of cow-pox, yet I have a single instance 

 before me where the virus acted locally only, but it is not in 

 the least probable that the same person would resist the action 

 both of the cow-pox virus and the variolous. 



Elizabeth Sarfenet lived as a dairymaid at Newpark farm, 

 in this parish. All the cows and the servants employed in 

 milking had the cow-pox; but this woman, though she had 







