t his thoughts were inclined in this
direction by the remembrance of the sufferings inflicted upon himself
by the process of inoculation. Through six weeks that process lingered.
He was bled, purged, and put on a low diet, until 'this barbarism of
human veterinary practice' had reduced him to a skeleton. He was then
exposed to the contagion of the small-pox. Happily, he had but a mild
attack; yet the disease itself and the inoculating operations, were
probably the causes of the excessive sensitiveness which afflicted him
through life.

"When Jenner was acting as a surgeon's articled pupil at Sudbury, a
young countrywoman applied to him for advice. In her presence some
chance allusion was made to the universal disease, on which she
remarked: 'I shall never take it, for I have had the cow-pox.' The
remark induced him to make inquiries; and he found that a pustular
eruption, derived from infection, appeared on the hands of milkers,
communicated from the teats of cows similarly disordered; this eruption
was regarded as a safeguard against small-pox. The subject occupied his
mind so much that he frequently mentioned it to John Hunter and the
great surgeon occasionally alluded to it in his lectures, but never
seems to have adopted Jenner's idea that it might suggest some
efficacious substitute for inoculation. Jenner, however, continued his
inquiries, and in 1780 he confided to his friend, Edward Gardner, his
hope and prayer that it might be his work in life to extirpate smallpox
by the mode of treatment now so familiar under the name of vaccination.

"At the meetings of the Alveston and Radborough Medical Clubs, of both
of which Jenner was a member, he so frequently enlarged upon his
favorite theme, and so repeatedly insisted upon the value of cow-pox as
a prophylactic, that he was denounced as a nuisance, and in a jest it
was even proposed that if the orator further sinned, he should then and
there be expelled. Nowhere could the prophet find a disciple and
enforce the lesson upon the ignorant; like most benefactors of mankind
he had to do his work unaided. Patiently and perseveringly he pushed
forward his investigations. The aim he had in view was too great for
ridicule to daunt, or indifference to discourage him. When he surveyed
the mental and physical agony inflicted by the disease, and the thought
occurred to him that he was on the point of finding a sure and certain
remedy, his benevolent heart overflowed with unsel