DEDICATED In all sincerity
(but without permission)
to the
MEMBERS OF THE JENNER SOCIETY
Some months since the leaders of the Government dismayed their supporters andastonished the world by a sudden surrender to the clamour of theanti-vaccinationists. In the space of a single evening, with a marvellousversatility, they threw to the agitators the ascertained results of generationsof the medical faculty, the report of a Royal Commission, what are understoodto be their own convictions, and the President of the Local Government Board.After one ineffectual fight the House of Lords answered to the whip, and, underthe guise of a “graceful concession,” the health of the country wasgiven without appeal into the hand of the “Conscientious Objector.”
In his perplexity it has occurred to an observer of these events—as aperson who in other lands has seen and learned something of the ravages ofsmallpox among the unvaccinated—to try to forecast their natural and, inthe view of many, their almost certain end. Hence these pages from the lifehistory of the pitiable, but unfortunate Dr. Therne.[*] Absit omen! Maythe prophecy be falsified! But, on the other hand, it may not. Some who arevery competent to judge say that it will not; that, on the contrary, thisstrange paralysis of “the most powerful ministry of the generation”must result hereafter in much terror, and in the sacrifice of innocent lives.
[*] It need hardly be explained that Dr. Therne himself is a characterconvenient to the dramatic purpose of the story, and in no way intended to betaken as a type of anti-vaccinationist medical men, who are, the authorbelieves, as conscientious in principle as they are select in number.
The importance of the issue to those helpless children from whom the State hasthus withdrawn its shield, is this writer’s excuse for inviting thepublic to interest itself in a medical tale. As for the moral, each reader canfashion it to his fancy.
James Therne is not my real name, for why should I publish it to the world? Ayear or two ago it was famous—or in