6 as we now look at unmoved. It was a boldness not of knowledge that first made light of such signs of dying, and found that what looked like a sleep of death was as safe as the beginning of a night's rest. Still, with all fair allowance for these and other difficulties, we cannot but see and wonder that for more than forty years of this century a great truth lay unobserved, though it was covered with only so thin a veil that a careful physiological research must have discovered it. The discovery ought to have been made by following the suggestion of Davy. The book in which he wrote that nitrous oxide-capable of destroying physical pain-may probably be used with advantage during surgical operations,' was widely read, and it would be hard to name a man of science more widely known and talked of than he was. Within two years of the publication of his Researches, he was appointed to a professorship in the Royal Institution; and in the next year he was a favourite in the fashionable as well as in the scientific world; and all his life through he was intimately associated with those among whom all the various motives for desiring to find some means 'capable of destroying physical pain' would be most strongly felt. Curiosity, the love of truth, the love of marvels, the desire of ease, self-interest, benevolence-all were alert in the minds of men and women who knew and trusted whatever Davy said or wrote, but not one mind was earnestly directed to the rare promise which his words contained. His own mind was turned with its full force to other studies; the interest in surgery which he may have felt during his apprenticeship at Bodmin was lost in his devotion to poetry, philosophy, and natural science, and there is no evidence that he urged others to undertake the study which he left. Even his biographers, his brother Dr. John Davy, and his intimate friend Dr. Paris, both of whom were very capable physicians and men of active intellect, say nothing of his suggestion of the use of nitrous oxide. It was overlooked and utterly forgotten till the prophecy was fulfilled by those who had never heard of it. The same may be said of what Faraday, if it were he, wrote of the influence of sulphuric ether. All was soon forgotten, and the clue to the discovery, which would have been far easier with ether than with nitrous oxide, for it needed no apparatus, and even required mixture with air, was again lost. One could have wished that the honour of bringing so great a boon to men, and so great a help in the pursuit of knowledge, had been won by some of those who were giving themselves with careful cultivation to the search for truth as for its own sake. But it was not so: science was utterly at fault; and it was shown that in the search for truth there are contingencies in which men of ready belief and rough enterprise, seeking for mere utility even with selfish purposes, can achieve more than those who restrain themselves within the range of what seems reasonable. Such instances of delay in the discovery of truth are always wondered at, but they are not uncommon. Long before Jenner demonstrated the utility of vaccination it was known in Gloucestershire that they who had had cow-pox could not catch the small-pox. For some years before the invention of electric telegraphy, Professor Cumming of Cambridge, when describing to his class the then recent discovery by Oersted of the power of an electric current to deflect a magnet, used to say, 'Here, then, are the elements which would excellently serve for a system of telegraphy.' Yet none of his hearers, active and cultivated as they were, were moved from the routine of study. Laennec quotes a sentence from Hippocrates which, if it had been worthily studied, might have led to the full discovery of auscultation. Thus it often has been; and few prophecies can be safer than that our successors will wonder at us as we do at those before us; will wonder that we did not discern the great truths which they will say were all around us, within reach of any clear, earnest mind. They will wonder, too, as we may, when we study the history of the discovery of anesthetics, at the quietude with which habitual miseries are borne; at the very faint impulse to action which is given by even great necessities when they are habitual. Thinking of the pain of surgical operations, one would think that men would have rushed after the barest chance of putting an end to it as they would have rushed to escape from starving. But it was not so; the misery was so frequent, so nearly customary, deemed so inevitable, that, though it excited horror when it was talked of, it did not excite to strenuous action. Remedies were wished for and sometimes tried, but all was done vaguely and faintly; there was neither hope enough to excite intense desire, nor desire enough to encourage hope; the misery was put up with' just as we now put up with typhoid fever and sea-sickness, with local floods and droughts, with the waste of health and wealth in the pollutions of rivers, with hideous noises and foul smells, and many other miseries. Our successors, when they have remedied or prevented them, will look back on them with horror, and on us with wonder and contempt for what they will call our idleness or blindness or indifference to suffering. JAMES PAGET. INDEX TO VOL. VI. The titles of articles are printed in italics. A ABI BIVERD, probable occupation of, Achaians, religion of the, 757 its analogies with Hebrew Scripture, Adye (Lt. Gen. Sir J.), The British Afghan war, India's contribution to the Afghan War, the Results of the, 377-400 Agricultural Reform, the Public Interest Ajmere, description of, 247-248 553-570 Alkali waste heaps, noxious effects of, Allahabad, description of, 123 at the British Association meeting, Alsace-Lorraine since 1871, 819-831 Anæsthetics, history of the discovery of Army Bill, the Irish members' conduct Purchase Bill, Tory obstruction of improved scheme of service in the, 8 BIS Artists, Government and the, 968-984 Assyria, commercial arrangements of, Atheism, Modern, and Mr. Mallock, 585– Audiometer, researches with the, 738- Augustine, baptismal doctrine of, 694- 695 Australia, transportation to, 875, 877- BABYLONIA, a banking firm of, 793 Banks, early national, 801-802 Bassein, 723 Bath, Order of the, why so termed, 689 Bear (William E.), The Public Interest Bengal, ryot holdings in, 260 Bengal, the Domesday Book of, 1033- Berlin Memorandum, British policy in -Treaty of, the Turkish reforms stipu- Bernhardt (Mlle.), as compared with Bevington (Miss L. S.), Modern Atheism Bidder, visualising faculty of, 159 Biology illustrated by dynamics, 919- Bishoprics, new, creation of, 84 Calcite, 733 Calcutta, description of, 537 cession of, to the East India Com- Canada, Moose-hunting in, 45-65 Cawnpore, description of, 124-126 Child, the banking house of, 805 743-744 DIN Clerical Education in France: a Keply, Cobden on British manufactures, 181 etymology of, 804-805 Colonies, how not to retain the, 170–178 Commons, House of, declining condition Commons, House of, Public Business in Communion, practice of, in the Church Comte (Auguste), English recognition Concordat, the French, 1094-1098 Conservatism, strength of, 361–362 - nature and mode of action of, 810- DACCA, description of, 536 Dahll (Dr.), discovery of a new Daubrée (M.), his researches in experi- Davies (Miss Emily), exertions of, in Delhi, notes of a visit to, 244–245 Diamond fields, policy of annexing the, Dieulafait (M.), on the prevalence of ASTERN question, British versus Education, condition of, in England and on the Continent, compared, 630-632 - Women's, Personal Recollections of, Clerical, in France: a Reply, 447– Egyptians, ancient, coinage unknown Eighteenth Century, a Plea for the, Election, prospects of the Liberals at the, Electoral systems, efficiency of, as means of securing representation, 144-149 Ellis (R. L.), his notion of mathematical Emotions, part played in recreation by England, Modern, Familiar Letters on, England, history of coinage in, 802-804 English rule in India, a rajah's opinion dissatisfaction of natives with, 720- 721 Farmers' Alliance, agricultural re- the question of security for, 579-581 Indian, 126, 134–135, 245, 253 Ferry (Jules), the law of, 27, 40, 43-44, Flogging in the Army, 604-614 Foreign policy of the late Government, France, hatred of, for Germany, 820 France, the Education Question in, 23-44 Free trade, meaning of, 180 French Play in London, the, 228-243 Church, on the Present State of the, Friendly societies, position of, 897-898 GALETY at the, 182-183, 241-242 YAIETY Theatre, the Comédie Fran- Galton (Francis), Generic Images, 157- Game laws, reform of the, 582 Garnish of dishes, 100, 101 Germany, hatred of the French in, 820 |