tion-table.' From his mountain-height
of statistics Mr. Simon says: 'Wheresoever vaccination falls into
neglect, small-pox tends to become again the same frightful pestilence
it was in the days before Jenner's discovery; and wherever it is
universally and properly performed, small-pox tends to be of as little
effect as any extinct epidemic of the Middle Ages.'

Are other diseases ever produced by vaccination?--The popular belief
would answer this question in the affirmative. All affections of the
skin and swelling's of the glands noticed in children soon after
vaccination, are attributed by parents in many cases to this operation.
They forget that such diseases are met with constantly in infancy and
childhood, as often among the unvaccinated as the vaccinated.
Observation does not show that they occur with greater frequency among
the vaccinated. An English physician has been at the trouble to examine
and record a thousand cases of skin disease in children: he found no
evidence whatever that vaccination disposes the constitution to such
affections. It has been stated with apparent justness, that parental
complaints of this kind frequently arise from their unwillingness to
believe there is anything wrong in their offspring. Hence, when other
diseases follow, vaccination gets blamed for what is really and truly
due to other causes. So far from doing any harm to the system, it has
been observed in those countries where vaccination has been most
thoroughly practised, that, leaving small-pox out of the question, there
have been fewer deaths from other maladies. This is especially true of
two of the most important classes of diseases, namely, scrofulous
affections and low fever. For this reason, some medical statisticians
have attributed to vaccination an indirect protective influence against
these disorders.

At what _age_ should the child be vaccinated?--If the health permit, the
operation should always be performed in very early infancy. The chief
sufferers from small-pox are young children. One-fourth of all who die
from this fatal disease in England are children under the age of one
year. In Scotland, where until recently vaccination has been much more
neglected than in England, the proportion even amounted to nearly
one-third; and of these, one-fourth were under the age of three months.
The great risk, particularly in large towns, where small-pox is seldom
absent, of delaying vaccination is obvious. City children, if he