I do not see the bearing of his proposition, if it were true.
But it is one of those assertions that fall in a moment before a slight
examination of the facts; and I confess my surprise, that a professor who
lectures on the Diseases of Women should have ventured to make it.
Nearly seven pages are devoted to showing that I was wrong in saying I
would not be "understood to imply that there exists a doubt in the mind
of any well-informed member of the medical profession as to the fact that
puerperal fever is sometimes communicated from one person to another,
both directly and indirectly." I will devote seven lines to these seven
pages, which seven lines, if I may say it without offence, are, as it
seems to me, six more than are strictly necessary.
The following authors are cited as sceptics by Dr. Meigs: Dewees.--I
cited the same passage. Did not know half the facts. Robert
Lee.--Believes the disease is sometimes communicable by contagion.
Tonnelle, Baudelocque. Both cited by me. Jacquemier.--Published three
years after my Essay. Kiwisch. "Behindhand in knowledge of Puerperal
Fever." [B. & F. Med. Rev. Jan. 1842.] Paul Dubois.--Scanzoni.
These Continental writers not well informed on this point.[See Dr.
Simpson's Remarks at Meeting of Edin. Med. Chir. Soc. (Am. Jour.
Oct. 1851.)]
The story of Von Busch is of interest and value, but there is nothing in
it which need perplex the student.
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