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tion for many years past, and it is impossible to say how many
of these newcomers may have been unvaccinated children. It
is to be hoped that some light may be thrown on this question
in the course of the house-to-house visitation.
I have taken occasion in former reports to point out the advantages
of vaccination and re-vaccination, and shown the general
effect of the operation in preventing small-pox: and its influence
both in modifying the disease when it occurs, and in controlling
the mortality. I do not think it necessary to do more now than refer
to the observations contained in previous reports. I may, however,
notice some pertinent remarks by the Registrar-General, contained
in the" Weekly Return,'' (No. 23), dated 11th June, 1877,
on a subject of much interest: for it is certain that vaccination has
been brought into some disrepute by the loose use of terms to which
the Registrar-General refers. He says, " the word ' vaccinated '
is ambiguous, for it is applied (1) popularly, to the operation of
puncturing the skin and inserting vaccine lymph without reference
to its effect: and (2) scientifically, to vaccination that induces cow
pox. Two words are needed, and the word ' vaccinized ' might be
used with advantage in the second case, when cow pox is induced,
and distinct marks are left. Should the word vaccinized not be
used, a child must not be described in the medical certificate as
' vaccinated,' unless it had distinct marks of cow pox before the
appearance of the small pox eruption."
These remarks will receive the respectful attention of the medical
profession, and it may be hoped that before very long we shall have
clearer evidence than heretofore of the fatality of small pox after
successful vaccination, which implies a condition of complete alteration
or modification of the entire system, very much the same
in nature as follows upon small pox:—Cow pox, which is given to
man by vaccination, being the small pox of the cow, a mild disease
both in the animal and in man. Hence if a certain number of
true Jennerian vesicles are not produced a person should not be
described as "vaccinized." Vaccination is no trivial operation,
and every point connected with it needs to be studied with the
utmost care, while the operation itself should be surrounded with all
those precautions in selecting the vaccine givers, and in the time
and mode of vaccination which Jenner, himself the most careful
of vaccinators, deemed essential to secure a successful, i.e., a protective
result.
LICENSED SLAUGHTER HOUSES.
The licensed slaughter houses at the present time are 31 in number
two less than last year, viz., 21 in the North, and 10 in the South
Sanitary District (vide Table 11 appendix). No application has
as yet been made for a license "to establish the business of a