ncy of superfluous demonstration. Examined in
detail, this and much of the show of testimony brought up to stare
the daylight of conviction out of countenance, proves to be in a great
measure unmeaning and inapplicable, as might be easily shown were it
necessary. Nor do I feel the necessity of enforcing the conclusion
which arises spontaneously from the facts which have been enumerated, by
formally citing the opinions of those grave authorities who have for the
last half-century been sounding the unwelcome truth it has cost so many
lives to establish.

"It is to the British practitioner," says Dr. Rigby, "that we are
indebted for strongly insisting upon this important and dangerous
character of puerperal fever."

The names of Gordon, John Clarke, Denman, Burns, Young, Hamilton,
Haighton, Good, Waller; Blundell, Gooch, Ramsbotham, Douglas, Lee,
Ingleby, Locock, Abercrombie, Alison; Travers, Rigby, and Watson, many
of whose writings I have already referred to, may have some influence
with those who prefer the weight of authorities to the simple deductions
of their own reason from the facts laid before them. A few Continental
writers have adopted similar conclusions. It gives me pleasure to
remember, that while the doctrine has been unceremoniously discredited
in one of the leading Journals, and made very light of by teachers in
two of the principal Medical Schools, of this country, Dr. Channing has
for many years inculcated, and enforced by examples, the danger to
be apprehended and the precautions to be taken in the disease under
consideration.

I have no wish to express any harsh feeling with regard to the painful
subject which has come before us. If there are any so far excited by the
story of these dreadful events that they ask for some word of indignant
remonstrance to show that science does not turn the hearts of its
followers into ice or stone, let me remind them that such words have
been uttered by those who speak with an authority I could not claim. It
is as a lesson rather than as a reproach that I call up the memory
of these irreparable errors and wrongs. No tongue can tell the
heart-breaking calamity they have caused; they have closed the eyes
just opened upon a new world of love and happiness; they have bowed the
strength of manhood into the dust; they have cast the helplessness of
infancy into the stranger's arms, or bequeathed it, with less cruelty,
the death of its dying parent. There is no tone deep en