I875-] 



SMALL-POX. 



327 



which also I was not interrupted ; but Dr. Larocque attempted 

 more argument, and was not so politely received. I suppose his 

 views were regarded as improper for a Canadian, while they 

 were allowable in an Englishman." He remarked that they 

 were the French Canadians of the Province who had passed the 

 Acts, and dreaded small-pox: " unfortunately for the rest of our 

 part of the world, there are many thousands in our city, of whom 

 six hundred met last Sunday, who act as though they loved it, 

 and were determined to visit it upon us also." In this and 

 other letters he pleaded for vaccination. He did not profess 

 to have given special study to it ; but as what he supposed 

 its acknowledged benefit was questioned, he wrote to Eng- 

 land for documents (e.g. the Report to the Local Govern- 

 ment Board), and to Dr. Snow, the most successful sanitarian 

 of his acquaintance in the United States, whose letter he 

 printed, with a translation into French, in "The Witness." He 

 candidly allowed that he had not been aware that the Anti- 

 vaccinators (among whom, in England, were his friend Pro- 

 fessor Newman, and others) had so much to urge ; still what 

 'was to be done ? "I have never looked upon vaccination as 

 a Heaven-sent remedy ; but simply as a lesser evil accepted to 

 cure a greater. Almost all the remedies used by both allopathic 

 and homoeopathic doctors are of the same nature : they are 

 poisons * introduced into the system in hopes of counteracting 

 the effect of worse poisons. Every possible pains should be taken 

 to procure the real cow-pox matter : and then, till some better 

 remedy be found, I would compel its use. . . . Six times the 

 number have died per thousand of the race who applaud Dr. 

 Coderre, than have died among the English, even with the 

 present corrupted vaccine, and with exposure to the French 

 contagion. . . . One sentence in Dr. Coderre's letter I heartily 

 endorse, and believe that true cleanliness, within and with- 

 out, will produce more beneficial results than the lymph has 

 ever done. If we breathed purer air, drank (and washed over 

 daily with) purer water, ate pure food, allowed none but pure 

 thoughts and chaste actions : if the poisons of alcohol, tobacco, 



* These poisons, however, are not given to persons in health. 



