class, from those most
distinguished by intellectual superiority and its successful
application, down to the humble writer of the present observations.
Facts are continually passing before us unnoticed, till, from their
repeated coincidence, or some accidental impulse, we attempt, and
finally are enabled, to trace their origin.

Thus, until the possibility of Meningitis originating from protracted
lactation had been suggested, practitioners were, of course, unable to
notice the fact--not from its non-occurrence, but because their
unconsciousness of its existence must necessarily preclude the inquiries
from which alone its cause could be determined. Hence a practitioner may
have treated many hundred cases of water on the brain in children,
without being able to attribute any one of them to protracted suckling;
yet this is no proof that such cases did not happen, for, had he made
the requisite inquiries, very probably many among them might have been
found which had thus arisen.

Another objection that may possibly be made to my views, is, that
instances might be adduced where lactation had been persevered in for a
very long period, without any ill effects supervening. That such
frequently occur, there is no doubt; and with respect to them, I have
merely to observe, that they do not in the slightest degree invalidate
the correctness of my conclusions. As well might it be argued, that
because persons have fallen from a very great height without sustaining
any injury, or, because poisonous doses of various drugs have sometimes
been swallowed without death supervening, that, therefore, there is no
danger in jumping from a precipice, or in taking a virulent poison; or
that death never occurs from these causes. Such cases, unless far more
numerous than I imagine them, can only be regarded as exceptions to the
general rule; and, consequently, do not lessen its authority, there
being no rule without an exception.

Some practitioners, with whom I have conversed on the subject, though
willing to allow that protracted suckling, by depraving the milk, may be
the means of occasioning Meningitis in infants during or shortly after
the time they are supplied with this improper food, yet could not
conceive how it can act as a cause of that disease at some future
period; I do not myself, while attempting to account for it, discover
any pathological difficulty.

In these cases it is very probable, that although the protracted
suckling