1884.1 
Analyses of Books. 
607 
Vaccination. By Alexander Wheeler. London : E. W. 
Allen. 
Thr Anti-vaccinationists, like “ anti ” people generally, cannot 
be accused of inactivity. Although some prophets of their own 
have suffered in their persons and their families from the present 
epidemic, they by no means relax in their efforts. The author of 
the present pamphlet spends a very large proportion of his space 
in endeavouring to prove that smallpox is not “ the most 
destructive or terrible English disease.” He writes : — The 
Committee (Parliamentary) of 1871 tell us that it was the most 
terrible of diseases.” But if we turn to the very words of the 
Committee, as quoted by himself on the first page of his pam- 
phlet, we read — “ Smallpox is one of the most terrible and 
destructive ot diseases.” This seems to us a very different pro- 
position from the one which Mr. Wheeler undertakes to refute. 
He tells us that “ the years of greatest mortality are those of the 
least extension of smallpox,” and he complains that “ the exhi- 
bition of this faCt has stupidly led some to charge us with fond- 
ness for smallpox.” But supposing this is true, — supposing that 
during epidemics of smallpox the gross mortality is greatest, and 
that when it is absent such mortality is least, — we submit that 
this is nothing to the purpose. It can prove nothing as to the 
efficacy or inefficacy of vaccination, and is therefore altogether 
out of place. 
We must further remind him that the terribleness of smallpox 
cannot be measured by death-rates. We have no statistics of 
blindness and disfigurement — the former certainly an evil worse 
than death, both to the individual affeCted and the community. 
Nor is disfigurement a trifling evil. We speak advisedly when 
we say that a pitted face is no trifling hindrance to persons of 
either sex in quest of employment. Again, an attack of small- 
pox not merely causes the patient himself to lose his situation, 
but it has often the same effeCt on other inmates of the house! 
Surely, in face of such indisputable fads, smallpox may well be 
called one of the most “ terrible diseases,” and whether the 
years of least smallpox have more deaths than the years of most 
smallpox or not is a somewhat frivolous question. 
We must also take exception to the following : — “ Till the rite 
(vaccination) is in abeyance we cannot tell certainly if we cannot 
control smallpox by sanitation equally with other diseases.” The 
facfts of the case surely prove that we cannot. The author con- 
tends that smallpox is little changed. He writes “ that small- 
pox has decreased in prevalence, but that is a feature common 
to it and other diseases ; and that other diseases have much ex- 
ceeded it in severity, and yet also in decline, in consequence of 
sanitation.” Well, then, if vaccination plus sanitation has 
