U

VAB

or u, the 20th letter and 5th vowel of our alphabet, is formed in the voice by a round configuration of the lips, and a greater extrusion of the under one than in forming the letter o, and the tongue is also more cannulated. The sound is short in curst, must, tun, tub; but is lengthened by a final e, as in tune, tube, &c. In some words it is rather acute than long; as in brute, flute, lute, &c. It is mostly long in polysyllables; as in union, curious, &c. but in some words it is obscure, as in nature, venture, &c. This letter in the form of V, or v, is properly a consonant, and as such is placed before all the vowels; as in vacant, venal, vibrate, &c. Though the letters v and u had always two sounds, they had only the form v till the beginning of the fourth century, when the other form was introduced, the inconvenience of expressing two different sounds by the same letter having been observed long before. In numerals V stands for five; and with a dash added at top, thus V, it signifies 5000. In abbreviations, amongst the Romans, V. A. stood for veterani assignati; V. B. viro bono; V. B. A. viri honi arbitratu; V. B. F. vir bonce fidei, V. C. vir consularis; V. C. C. F. vale corjur charissime, feliciter; V. D. D. voto dedicatur; V. G. verbi gratia; Vir. Ve. virgo vestalis; VL. videlicet; V. N. quinto nona

VAC

VACANCY. s. (from vacant.) 1. Empty space; vacuity (Shaks.). 2. Chasm; space unfilled (Watts). 3. State of a post or employment when it is unsupplied (Ayliffe). 4. Time of leisure; relaxation; interinission time unengaged (Watts). 5. Listlessness; emptiness of thought (Wotton).

VACANT. a. (vacant, Fr. vacans, Lat.) 1. Empty; unfilled; void (Boyle). 2. Free; unencumbered; uncrowded (More). 3. Not filled by an incumbent, or possessor (Swift). 4. Being at leisure; disengaged (Clarendon). 5. Thoughtless; empty of thought; not busy.

To VACATE. v. n. (vaco, Latin.) 1. To annul; to make void; to make of no authority (Nelson). 2. To make vacant; to quit possession of. 3. To defeat; to put an end to (Dryden).

VACATION. s. (vacatio, Latin.) 1. Intermission of juridical proceedings, or any other stated employments; recess of courts or senates (Cowell). 2. Leisure; freedom from trouble or perplexity (Hammond).

VACCARY. s. (vacca, Latin.) A cowhouse; a cow-pasture (Bailey).

VACCINATION, in medicine, the process of inoculating a person with the virus of the discase, called vaccina, or cow-pox, in order to render him incapable of being infected by the small-pox; thus employing a milder disease as an antidote to a severer.

This may be regarded as one of the most im.

portant discoveries of modern times, and although strenuously opposed and decried by individuals in most countries, has met with all the support and countenance from all the governments of every part of the globe to which it is entitled. Under the article INOCULATION WE have entered at some length into the history and praxis of this admirable preservative, and have

B

cursorily examined into the testimonies in its favour. That article, however, has been written for more than three years from the present time: in the course of which period vaccination has been tried upon a much more extended scale, and its effects have been examined with still closer precision, and we are happy to add, with more philosophical coolness. One of the best papers that has been given to the world by the French Imperial Institute is an article upon this subject, drawn up by three of its brightest ornaments, M. M. Berthollet, Percy and Halle, and read August 17, 1812. It has since been published, on account of its national, or rather its universal, importance in the Moniteur, and we cannot forbear presenting our readers with the following translation of that part of it which chiefly examines and replies to the general observations which in different countries have been advanced in opposition to it. These observations are put in the form of six successive queries; each of which receives its proper answer.

I. Do the fever and the general eruption which follow the inoculation for the small-pox, but do not appear after vaccination, constitute a necessary purification of the system, the want of which may lead to dangerous consequences?

II. Do the facts observed demonstrate that the cow-pox, introduced into the system, is of such a nature as to produce eruptions, or accidents, which ought to be ascribed to the difficulty, the imperfection, or the want of eruptions?

III. Is the virus introduced by vaccination of such a nature as to produce immediately, that is, during the development of the natural effects of vaccination, fatal accidents?

The first two of these queries are answered in the affirmative; the third in the negative. We must pass by the train of argument, though highly ingenious and conclusive, in order to notice, in a somewhat detailed manner, the three questions by which these are succeeded, and which are of considerably more practical importance.

IV. Is the virus introduced by vaccination of such a nature as to produce, even after its operation has terminated favourably, diseases, more or less severe, and which may even prove fatal?

The solution of this question is difficult, because our investigation is of necessity interrupted by a great number of uncertainties.

It is certainly difficult to establish, that a virus, introduced into the body, and capable of rendering it inaccessible to the small-pox contagion, has not the power of producing any other change which can affect the health. Such a consequence can only be the result of a number of observations, so great, that its disproportion with the contrary observations must prevent us from aşcribing them to any thing else but causes absolutely unconnected with the introduction of the virus.

But the observations in support of a contrary opinion must be equally difficult to obtain. If a disease appear after vaccination, in order to show that it can be ascribed to no other cause, we ought to know what was the state of the subject before vaccination, and whether his constitutional or hereditary temperament did not prepare him for those maladies which have taken place. We must be able to show that after vacsination he has not been exposed to causes capa

ble of producing these diseases. We ought likewise to inquire whether the source from which the cow-pox matter was derived was infected with any foreign ferment. And finally, as in all ages and all circumstances of life various diseases appear which cannot be assigned to any known cause, those which succeed vaccination ought, in order to be ascribed to it, to show such a character of affinity with each other as to indicate their common origin, and offer in their development a connexion more or less sensible with the primitive effects of vaccination to which they succeed.

It is therefore requisite to admit, in opposition to the advantages ascribed to vaccination, those observations only which are well authenticated, and the details of which are sufficiently complete to enable us to appreciate their value.

Nevertheless, if the number of facts alleged were very considerable, as it would be impossible in such a case to ascribe them to mere accident, they would in a great measure supply the place of exact observations, and would produce a certain degree of probability in their favour.

By attending to all these particulars we shall endeavour to give an answer to the question proposed.

We shall begin with the observations which have been given as proofs that there exists diseases which owe their origin to vaccination.

Among those that have been published, or that have come to our knowledge, there are very few which, considered separately, have the cha racter of exact observation; and not one possesses the conditions necessary to fix the relation of the malady noticed to the previous vaccination.

Out of eleven observations that have been particularly communicated to us, and which, from the precision with which the facts were announced, as well as the nature of the evidence of those who communicated them, seemed to deserve particular attention, we have had it in our power to verify seven. All of these seven were formally and authentically denied by ocular witnesses, most assiduous, and consequently best acquainted with the facts, either from situation, or the interest which attached them to the children who were the subject of these observations. We can only suppose that the persons, who communicated to us these observations, persons well informed, and without any motive to deceive, were led into error by false reports concerning things which they had not been able to see with their own eyes. After this it was natural for us to suspect the authenticity of the other facts which had come to our knowledge by the same means, though we had it not in our power to verify them by actual inquiry.

A fact reported to the medical society of Grenoble has been mentioned, and it is advanced in the work of M. Chappon, as a proof of the bad effects of vaccination. A child after vaccination had the face covered with pimples, which were succeeded by scabs that gave the face a hideous appearance. This was followed by an anasarca, and the case ended fatally. Notwithstanding the waut of details in this case, it is easy to perceive in it that eruption so familiar to infants, and known by the vulgar name of croute laiteuse (crusta lactea). Its appearance after vaccination does not prove that it had any thing in

Common with it. We frequently see the suppression of such eruptions produce very severe symptoms without the presence of vaccination, commonly either in the head or the organs of respiration.

The little exactness in the other observations which we might examine, renders it impossible to admit them as proofs in a discussion like the present.

We have met with strangers to the art of me dicine, especially parents, who have assured us that their children, after having been carefully and successfully vaccinated, experienced several inconveniences, sometimes eruptions, sometimes a weakness of health to which they had not been subject before vaccination. These symptoms in some cases obliged them to have recourse to blisters and issues in order to remove them. It was impossible for us to make ourselves so well acquainted with the origin of these facts as to be able to judge how far the allegations were well founded; but without rejecting them altogether, we may say that all the children, and even adults, that we have had an opportunity of vaccinating ourselves, or that we have seen vac. einated, never exhibited any such symptom.

There is a circumstance which we observe frequently, and to which we ought to attend particularly, while discussing the present question. We often see an accidental impression, an emotion, a fall, occasion the development of a disease, to the nature of which that occasional cause is obviously a stranger. The small-pox itself often appears after such accidents, and in other cases they have occasioned violent fevers or other maladies to which a disposition seems to have pre-existed, and only required an occasion to call it into action. Is it not also possible, that in circumstances which we can neither determine nor foresee, vaccination may give occasion to the appearance of a malady without being its cause, and thus bring about what any other commotion would have done, experienced at the same time? In that case there would be nothing in such diseases connected with vaccination, or proceeding from the cow-pox virus.

Since then there is not one of the observations, collected hitherto, which can of itself rve as a proof of the opinion which we are examining, it remains for us to see whether taken collectively their number is such, compared with that of the cases whose history is known, as to give some solidity to the objection.

The collections to which we have had recourse already, in order to give an answer to the other questions, will still furnish us with numerous facts to satisfy this.

The correspondence of Paris, besides the facts which we have noticed above, furnishes the following: erysipelas in the arm in the proportion of one case to 10,000; suppurations continuing in the cow-pox, in the proportion of one to 10,000; and these are only local accidents, particular to the parts on which the inoculation was performed. As to general accidents they have only been observed when from particular objects the number of punctures has been very much increased, as when they have amounted to 30, 10, 50, or even to 60. These accidents have been fever and convulsions, which did not in any instance terminate fatally. The cases collected by the society of Paris are all such as bare exhibited the characteristic progress of

true cow-pox, an observation of more importance than has always been supposd.

The facts furnished by the Bibliotheque Britannique afford us the following results. We shall notice those only which have been announced with so much precision as to give us an exact idea of the case.

In 1800 M. Odier announced at Geneva that out of 1500 persons vaccinated not one accident had occurred.

Dr. Anderson writes, in 1804, from Madras, to the Jennerian Society of London, that the number of vaccinations performed by the British and Indian physicians on English, Portuguese, Brahmin, Malabar, Gentoo, Mahometan, Half-cast, Pariah, Maratta, Canadian, and Rajaput sub jeets, amounted to 145,848; and that in none of these cases had a single accident been observed. This enumeration was made in 1803, and published in 1804 by the government of Madras.

In 1806 the Jennerian Society of London, in consequence of rumours propagated respecting vaccination, as if it occasioned various dreadful diseases till that time unknown, was induced to make an exact examination. The result of this, comprehended in twenty-two paragraphs, gives in paragraph twenty-one the following statement: the disease produced by vaccination is in general slight, and without bad consequences. The cases contrary to this conclusion are in small number, compared with the total number of cases, and may very naturally be ascribed to the constitution, or the peculiar disposition of the individuals who have exhibited the excep tions.

In 1807 the Society of Surgeons in London published another report, more precise; and in which they show the greatest reserve with respect to the consequences to be drawn from the results obtained. We have already said, in speaking of the eruptions following vaccination, that there were only sixty-six examples of them among 164,361 persons vaccinated; twenty-four erysipelatous affections only were observed out of the number sixty-six: and among these we must reckon the only three deaths which followed vaccination, and which have already been noticed. All this is the result of the answer of 426 correspondents, whose testimony was solicited by a circular letter.

In another place mention is made of the same erysipelatous cases, probably comprehended under the twenty-four which have been just mentioned. The disease is ascribed to the too great depth of the incisions, by means of which the cow-pox matter had been pushed too far below the skin, instead of being introduced between it and the epidermis. Other observations may give some probability to this presumption, which we shall not attempt to examine here.

At Aleppo, the English consul, Mr. Barker, has succeeded in familiarizing the people to vaccination: 600 were vaccinated in 1800, without observing a single disagreeable accident to follow.

In 1803 the Spanish government undertook the noble and generous enterprise of sending out an expedition, which terminated in 1806. The sole object of this expedition was to convey to all their American and Asiatic possessions the new means of preserving the colonies against the ravages of the small-fox.

A certain number of children was embarked, who were to be vaccinated successively during the voyage. In this manner the cow-pox virus

was transported to the Canaries, to Porto Rico, to the Caraccas, to Guatimala, to New Spain, to the Philippine islands, to Macao, to Canton, to the islands of Visaye, where a hostile nation was so struck with this act of generosity on the part of the Spaniards as immediately to lay down their arms. The colonists of St. Helena, who had hitherto refused the cow-pox matter from their own countrymen, received it from the Spaniards. The provinces of Terrafirma, of Carthagena, of Peru, &c. likewise received the cow-pox matter, which was even found indigenous near Puebla-de-los-Angeles, not far from Valladolid, and in the Caraccas. The viceroy of New Spain has attested that out of 50,000 individuals vaccinated in his government not a single unfavourable accident had come to his knowledge.

At Echaterinoslaff, the Duke of Richelieu, governor of the Crimea, assures us that out of 7065 individuals vaccinated in six months, not a single accident intervened, except one, in which the small-pox appeared the day after vaccination.

Finally, in 1810, M. Curioni, minister of the interior at Milan, wrote to M. Sacco that as far as his information went, not a single instance had ccurred of small-pox appearing upon individuals that had been vaccinated, and no disease whatever had followed the process.

It appears to us that the small number of unfavourable observations which have been collected, and among which we must not include those not well authenticated, and which depend upon assertions destitute of proof, disappear entirely before such a mass of facts.

V. Supposing that inoculation for the smallpox has the advantage of sometimes favouring the cure of certain chronical diseases, is this advantage peculiar to it, and ought it to ensure it a preference over vaccination?

This question does not present fewer difficulties than the preceding.

In speaking of the diseases, the origin of which has been referred to vaccination, we might have observed that the same reproach had been thrown against the small-pox, and that not without some reason. Not to mention former authors suspected of partiality, we shall satisfy ourselves with referring to the authors of the Bibliotheque Britannique, who have given some instances. Other facts of an opposite nature have been alleged, showing that inoculation is an epoch of an advantageous change in the constitution, by the cessation of various infirmities, and the confirmation of the health and constitution of the person inoculated.

These advantages have been ascribed either to the perfection of the eruption, and the regularity of the general commotion which accompanies it, or regarded as the effect of the suppurations proJonged in the place where the inoculation was performed; a phenomenon which has been imiiated by means of a supplementary suppuration, induced by blisters when the circumstances of the case seemed to require it. It has been conceived that these evacuations destroyed the causes of the diseases formerly existing, and in the midst of which the small-pox had made its appearance.

Observers will not consider it as a contradic tion to say that a commotion excited by the introduction of the matter of small-pox may pro

duce results that seem diametrically opposite te each other. These effects do not appear contradietory, but because they vary according to the disposition and the strength of the subjects whe receive the virus, and according as the essential phenomena of the malady, which this virus occasions, take place with more or less violence, regularity, er perfection. The fact exists. The only conclusion, which in our opinion can be drawn, is that these effects depend upon general laws, which it is not our business here to explain, and that they must not be regarded as a specific property, which, if it did exist, could not give birth to consequences so different.

We must, nevertheless, acknowledge, that however striking the observations may be, they de not lead to a striking demonstration. Hence, when any person says that inoculation favours the cure of a particular disease, we must restrict the proposition to mean nothing more than a simple expression of the particular fact observed. A person was afflicted with a chronic disease, from the knowledge of the character and progress of which we could not expect a speedy cure. This person was inoculated, and soon after the cure took place in a manner quite unexpected. Such is the fact. To draw as a consequence that the inoculation was the cause of the cure, it would be necessary that analogous instances had either always, or at least very frequently, occurred; otherwise the coincidence may have been entirely accidentai.

Examples are given of obstinate, even hereditary ulcers, of cachexy, scurvy, eruptions, &c. cured in consequence of inoculation. The cha racter of those who have attested these facts does not permit us to call them in question. We readily admit them; but to prove that these advantages ought to establish a preference for inoculation with the small-pox matter over vaccination, it would be at least necessary to prove that vaccination has not been followed by equally fortunate consequences; but the very contrary fact results from the observations collected by the correspondence of Paris, and from several cases announced in the works extracted by the authors of the Bibliotheque Britannique. The variety of facts announced by the correspondence of Paris is so great that it might even lead to some scepticism. We shall therefore only notice those relations which are given by persons entitled to draw our attention, and those the details of which contain some interesting particulars, Without attempting to draw any consequences from them, we shall simply present a short state

ment.

Mr. Richard Dunning, of Plymouth, in a work published in London in 1800, entitled Some Observations on Vaccination, &c. when speaking of the effects of vaccination on the health, says, that he has generally observed the health improved by vaccination, and he gives two instances: the first a young girl, daughter of a consumptive father, subject to vomiting, and continually labouring under oppression, with a cadaverous aspect spotted with livid blotches. After a for tunate and successful vaccination, she in a few months recovered the best possible state of health. The second example was a child two years of age, naturally delicate, recovering from an inflammation of the breast, but still pale, very feeble, and oppressed. This child, after vacci nation, speedily recovered strength, acquired & good habit of body, a free respiration, and an