Oct. 29, 1885 | 
NATURE 
619 
as ptomaines, and produced by the growth and activity 
of putrefactive bacteria in media containing proteids. 
Brieger (“ Die Ptomaine,” Hirschwald, Berlin, 1335) has 
published a most important series of observations on the 
production, nature, and action of ptomaines, and has 
greatly enlarged our knowledge of this as yet obscure 
subject. The description of the symptoms observable on 
persons inoculated by Ferran (as given by a variety of 
independent witnesses and by Ferran himself), can leave 
little doubt that the result of these inoculations is septic 
poisoning, in severe cases dangerous phlegmon and ulcer- 
ation, and even death. This is also the opinion of a 
number of medical men (Spanish, English, and French) 
who have had the opportunity of seeing and examining 
such persons, as will be seen from the Report by the Special 
Commissioner of the British Medical F ourna/, the Report 
by the Special Commissioner of the 7zes, the Report 
by the Special French Commission, and the Report of 
the Commission sent by the Spanish Government. Such 
being the case, the inoculations practised by Ferran and 
his coadjutors can have no possible prophylactic effect 
against cholera, even granting, for the sake of argument, 
that one mild attack of cholera protects against a second 
severe one, a question which is still swd 7udice, since some 
competent authorities maintain that such immunity, 
although holding good in a number of infectious maladies, 
does not apply to cholera. 
4. Now, are persons inoculated by Ferran furnished with 
immunity against an attack of cholera? The statistics pub- 
lished by Dr. Ferran and his adherents on the marvellous 
effects of inoculation in Alcira, Valencia and other places, 
accepted by Dr. Cameron in his article above referred to, 
show us a picture of brilliant successes, favourably com- 
paring and even surpassing the statistics of the effect of 
vaccination against smallpox. Those statistics collected 
by Ferran being endorsed by several medical men and 
other notabilities of the town of Alcira and elsewhere, 
Dr. Cameron cannot bring himself to regard as not 
revealing the truth; he cannot imagine that all these 
worthy people should conspire to pervert the truth and to 
prevent the truth from becoming known. 
The correspondent of the 7zyzes in his letter, published 
October 20, gives a long list of places where the statistics 
published by the Ferranists are signed and stamped by 
the Alcalde of the place, the local judge, the priest, the 
resident doctors, and the notary; all duly signed and 
stamped. This Englishman, however, probably knowing 
what value to attach to the competency and veracity of 
all those worthies, examined the statistics for himself, 
and the result of his inquiry may be briefly summarised 
by saying that Dr. Ferran and his partisans have simply 
“cooked ” those statistics. They have done these things : 
when a person who had been inoculated by Ferran did 
nevertheless become affected with cholera, and died of it, 
death was put down as caused not by cholera but by 
some other disease; false entries were made as to persons 
who, having been inoculated, nevertheless died of cholera, 
were not entered as having been inoculated ; persons 
have been registered as having been “ vaccinated” by 
Ferran, but on inquiry were found to have died of cholera 
several days previous to the alleged “ vaccination.” 
Add to this the fact that in Alcira, for instance, the 
inoculations and their wonderful effects had not com- 
menced until the population had abandoned the impure 
water supply ; that in some places many of the inoculated 
persons belonging to the well-to-do classes (a fee being 
paid for the inoculation) were therefore less exposed to 
infection, and those statistics become a gross farce and 
a shameless imposture. And this is practically the 
opinion of the Special Commission sent by the Spanish 
Government ; this Commission has reported altogether 
unfavourably on these inoculations, declaring them barren 
of all scientific value, dangerous inasmuch as persons 
inoculated and suffering in consequence from a form of 
septic poisoning become more susceptible to infection 
from cholera and other diseases, and further condemning 
them as of no value in giving immunity against cholera. 
The fact that Dr. Ferran and his associates took pay- 
ment for the inoculations—thousands of persons were 
inoculated and reinoculated iu Valencia and elsewhere, 
for each inoculation a fee of from 5 to 12 francs being 
charged—gives to the whole business a very ugly look. 
The Zimes correspondent (7Zmes, October 20) does not 
therefore fully express the real value of Dr. Ferran when he 
says that he (Dr. Ferran) “is the dupe of illusions, con- 
ceived in ignorance.” E. KLEIN 
LIFE OF SIR WILLIAM ROWAN HAMILTON 
Life of Sir William Rowan Hamilton, Royal Astronomer 
of Ireland. By Robert Perceval Graves, M.A., Sub- 
Dean of the Chapel Royal. Vol. II. pp. 719. With 
Portrait. (Hodges, Figgis, and Co.) 
N a former number of this journal it was our duty to 
notice the first volume of the life of the illustrious 
Irish mathematician. We have now to congratulate Mr. 
Graves on the completion of the second instalment of that 
great work which has evidently been to him a labour of love. 
This volume, like its predecessor, bears abundant testi- 
mony to the conscientious manner in which the author 
has sought to delineate a picture of Hamilton, told as far 
as possible by the letters from Hamilton to his friends 
and by extracts from his journal. We are again surprised 
at the extraordinary copiousness of the materials which 
were available. 
The incidents in the life of Hamilton apart from his 
literary and scientific activity are but few. The last 
volume conducted us to the year 1832, when Hamilton 
was in his twenty-seventh year. We had there seen the 
troubled course of his two earlier love affairs, and at 
the outset of this volume we are introduced to the third 
with Miss Bayly, to whom he was married in 1833. His 
domestic happiness was in the course of years clouded 
over by the ill-health of his wife, though to the end he 
remained an attached husband, as she was an attached 
wife ; two sons and one daughter were the issue of this 
union. 
The reader of this work can hardly fail to be struck 
with the number and the worth of the friends to whom 
Hamilton was endeared ; he possessed to a remarkable 
degree the power of transforming a casual acquaintance- 
ship into a true and lasting friendship. His intimacy 
with Wordsworth has been already referred to, and was 
carried on by occasional letters and visits until the death 
of the poet. Among his other literary friends we may 
mention Maria Edgeworth, who writes to him (p. 384) :— 
