shop, where, by the faint glimmering of a candle, I could perceive a man with a faint meagre countenance sitting behind a kind of desk, having spectacles on his nose and a pen in his hand. This, I learned of Mr Thomson, was the ship's steward, who sat there to distribute provisions to the several messes, and to mark what each received."

The admirers of Smollett will have a pungent recollection of Roderick's fate, when he endeavoured to imitate that feat of the surgeon, which was achieved by creeping under the solid stratum of hammocks in the hospital, and cleaving his head through between them. We dare not conduct the reader further than the entrance of this hospital-it is far enough: "I assisted Thomson in making up his prescriptions; but when I followed him with the medicines into the sick berth or hospital, and observed the situation of the patients, I was much less surprised that people should die on board than that any sick person should recover.

There I saw about fifty miserable distempered wretches, suspended in rows, so huddled one on another that not more than fourteen inches space was allowed to each, with his bed and bedding, and deprived of the light of the day as well as of fresh air, breathing nothing but a noisome atmosphere of the morbid steams exhaling from their own excrements and diseased bodies; devoured with vermin hatched in the filth that surrounded them, and destitute of every convenience necessary for people in that helpless condition."

It was probably in such ships that Admiral Hosier's force died off every one of them, leaving the manning of the vessels to new recruits. Nay, it has been said that the complete complement of his fleet died twice over in the lingering expedition against the Spaniards, which it was his good fortune not to survive. But all this is merely introductory to the antithesis of two examples, showing the influence of sanitary neglect and sanitary exertion on shipboard, supplied by the vital statistics of two renowned voyages round the world.

In our youth the narrative, by

Walter, of Anson's Voyage round the World, was a book deservedly popular. Its author was not stamped in any of the fixed literary moulds of his age; indeed, his style would not have stood the tests in Blair's Rhetoric. The charm of his book lies in the unconscious earnestness with which he tells the daily events of the voyage, and explains in his own way the feelings of the actors and sufferers. It is no inconsiderable testimony to the author's hold on his reader's sympathy, that he commands it through a long continuous gloomy record of mortality, disease, and despondency. The interest is brought to a climax like the histories of the sighting of land by Columbus, when the survivors reached their destination-the fruitful island of Juan Fernandez, whence their boat returned laden with grass; "for though the island abounded with better vegetables, yet the boat's crew in their short stay had not met with them, and they well knew that even grass would prove a dainty, as indeed it was all soon and eagerly devoured." But alas! they were far too late in reaching the land of promise and relief. The very possibility of landing was problematical. In one vessel, which, as the narrator says, had passed the Straits of Le Maire with between four and five hundred men in health and strength, "the lieutenant could muster no more than two quartermasters and six foremast-men capable of working." These, assisted by the officers' servants and boys, took two hours to trim the sails. When they sent 167 sick on shore, twelve died in the boats; and so many of those who reached land alive were beyond the reinvigorating power of fresh air, that for the first ten or twelve days there were six burials daily. The summation of the whole was, that when the plague was stopped, and the strength of the squadron was counted before leaving Juan Fernandez, of 961 men who had embarked in three ships, 335 were living and 626 dead. We hold this history of calamity to be peculiarly significant, because, along with some early similar misfortunes of his own, it prompted a zealous, humane, and skilful commander to turn anxiously

in his mind, whether it was the design of Providence that those who go down to the sea in ships should find the common causes of mortality more deadly in their ravages, than the tempests of the sea or the casualties of battle. The matter was really one of great doubt. The writer we have just been quoting from, languidly remarked, that he "would not be understood to assert that fresh provisions, plenty of water, and a constant supply of sweet air between decks, are matters of no moment;" but it was possible, he thought, that the freshest air might be rendered inimical to animal life, "by mixing with it some subtle and otherwise imperceptible effluvia;" and as an application of this hypothesis, he suggested for the consideration of the maritime world the consoling view, "that the steams arising from the ocean may have a tendency to render the air they are spread through less properly adapted to the support of the life of terrestrial animals, unless these steams are corrected by effluvia of another kind, which the land alone can afford." The solution of the question fell to Captain Cook. It was undertaken very appropriately in a repetition of the achievement-the circumnavigation of the globe-which, by so calamitous an issue, had raised the doubt. He had gone on one unfortunate voyage; he determined that, if skill and ceaseless attention were of any avail, he should not have another. He describes at length his adjust ment of the men's dietary, with the provision of antiscorbutics and other protective viands. But in conjunction with fresh provisions and vegetables, and with a continual supply of fresh water to the men, the most material part of his arrangements probably was, that "proper methods were taken to keep their persons, hammocks, bedding, clothes, &c., constantly clean and dry. Equal care was taken to keep the ship clean and dry betwixt decks. Once or twice a-week she was aired with fires, and when this could not be done, she was smoked with gunpowder mixed with vinegar and water. I had also fre

quently a fire made in an iron pot at the bottom of the well, which was of great use in purifying the air in the other parts of the ship," and so on. As our object is merely to afford a general notion of the tendency of Cook's arrangements, not to instruct future circumnavigators how to preserve their men, we need not quote farther.* He gives, with becoming seriousness, the reason for enumerating the several causes to which, under the care of Providence, the longcontinued health of his crew was owing; and he had, indeed, full ground for thankfulness when he had to say, that, after an absence of three years and eighteen days, he lost but four men, and only one of these by sickness.

We have dwelt somewhat on these two contrasted histories, because they show very distinctly what we have already referred to-the existence of sanitary opinions and practice long before the existence of a school of sanitary philosophers. In fact, there can be no doubt that the potency of sanitary arrangements is as clearly proved as that bread nourishes and arsenic kills. The result of Cook's experiment could not but tell in the department in which he practised it; and a ship in her Majesty's navy is now a different place, indeed, from that which Smollett described it, after having served in the navy. Yet that there should remain so much sanitary science still latent, affords uncomfortable evidence how slowly such improvements penetrate the crust of habit-how long they may remain unadopted, almost unknown, until they are borne in by some great pressure of public opinion -until, in short, a row is raised, and they are carried in the confusion by acclamation.

An old case in point has proved useful to us, moreover, as we do not desire to dwell too largely on recent events. The public has supped full of horrors on the details that have been so profusely laid before them about the sanitary condition of the camp in the Crimea, and the hospitals along the Bosphorus. There is generally, however, in any continuous series of

evils, some one characteristic matter denoting a climax-as the wasting on the face of a rock may mark the highest level of a flood. Such was the nature of the vermin which appeared upon our men in the Russian campaign. Of the lesser vermin

which infest the human frame in filth or disease, we have all heard often enough-many of us may have seen them; some of us-of course, in consequence of some charitable mission among "the lower orders"-may possibly have been subjected to the sanguinary attacks of a solitary wanderer from the herd. It is unnecessary to estimate the state of matters by the profuse supply of the smaller breeds, since both in the field hospital at Balaklava, and in the hospitals on the Bosphorus, the large and loathsome maggot crawled everywhere, and fed on the sores of the wounded soldiers. A nurse who crossed to Balaklava states in her diary, that she took a quart of them off one man. Perhaps it may be stated as a parallel floodmark of filth, that a dead horse and hospital

dressings are attested to have been seen in the tank for supplying one of the hospitals with water. And so enough of this dismal piece of experience. We leave it, subjoining merely the unimpassioned estimate by the Commission of Sanitary Inquiry of the causes and progress of the disaster, and the effect of the operations of the Commissioners who were sent out in winter to deal as best they could with the difficulties which they found.

"With regard to the hospitals at Scutari and Kulalee, the evidence shows that their unexampled mortality arose from other causes beside the severe type of disease. The drains of the hospitals were nothing better than cesspools, through which the wind blew sewer air into the corridors and wards. There was no ventilation; there had no lime-washing; the been little or ward utensils infected the atmosphere; the hospitals were overcrowded; there was an overcharged graveyard close to the general hospital; the number of sick admitted went on increasing; no sanitary improvements were effected, and the mortality rose progressively month by month as follows:

179

321

427

"During the month of February, although the mortality rose so considerably, the number of sick in hospital, as well as the admissions, had fallen off, and the deaths on board the transports were only one-sixth part in February of what they were in January, showing that though the army was becoming more healthy, the hospitals were be

April 9 to April 29.

April 29 to May 20. May 20 to June 10.

The question whether any individual official person, high or low, is blamable for the dark side of this statement, is entirely sunk in the much greater question, whether any system is to blame? Routine has got a deal of obloquy for it, but there must be routine in the public service. It is the only way in which the great bulk of public servants can work with any kind of safety or satisfaction to their employers; and the military de:

June 10 to June 30."

partment is far from being exempt from this necessity. The men of routine, indeed, are the ordinary machinery with which statesmen and generals work. The routine, in ordinary times, goes on like clockwork, of itself, merely requiring periodical winding up and occasional cleaning; and it does its business in a far more satisfactory manner to all concerned, than erratic genius could accomplishi it.

But when confusions and convul

sions cross it, then some strong hand must take its management-directing, reconstructing, or breaking it down, if need be, as a general in battle deals with the well-trained troops who may have paraded for many an unvarying year of peace in their several regiments, companies, and squads. That such a great strong hand does not come when it is called for, is not chargeable on routine; without it, matters would be still worse.

Brother to routine in usefulness and obloquy is professional etiquette, professional pedantry, or professional pride, as people may like to name it. It goes through all human nature, high and low. It may be called a grand enthusiasm when it is developed in some gifted intellect, devoting its whole energies to one object of goodness or duty, which it deems to be its own special mission. It passes down through lower grades of ardour, until it becomes the conventional pride of aptness in some professional or even mechanical pursuit. Perhaps its humblest known development was detected by a friend of ours in overhearing two members of the despised class who devote themselves to the sweeping of the streets, pronouncing on the merits of a departed brother of the broom. One of them was clear that the deceased had been, in every sense of the term, a great workman; the other, with critical discrimination, pronounced him " pital at the thick, but nothing at all at the thin"-this latter being, it seems, the department which exacted the greatest quickness of discrimination and agility of hand.

ca

It is needless to ask why; it is sufficient to know that this spirit is in constant activity throughout the working and doing part of mankind. It is in itself a useful spirit, speaking merely of its humbler shapes; and indeed it is difficult to see how the world could get on without it. It puts us all into those separate grooves of action by which we are carried to the objects of our special aspirations and desires-to the achievements we would wish to perform, and the honours we would fain reap. Newton would not have cared for a colonelcy in the Guards as the reward of his discoveries; Nelson would have had

very little estimation of a bishopric; Samuel Johnson would not have been very proud of the illustrious office of Lord Mayor of London. The hurrahs, and encores, and floral wreaths, which are blood and breath to the ambitious actress, would annihilate the ambitious woman of the world who toils for fashionable leadership. The genial Soyer, who might have distinguished himself in some department of literature, scorns all repute that does not rest on the legitimate honours of the taster and stewpan; and, standing by his order, demands that cookery shall be admitted high in the ranks of the liberal arts. The patriarch of his school, the venerable Eustace Ude, was still more supreme in his claims. He stated in his introduction to The French Cook, that he had found it necessary to acquire the English language, and become his own interpreter, since he had been translated by one who may indeed have known something of his own profession, being a general officer in the army, but knew nothing whatever of his, Eustace Ude's, with which he had so audaciously meddled. All this has the spirit of cheerful endeavour, of effective labour, and of general public usefulness in it. Annihilate it, or shift it from its natural place to some other, we cannot; and the object that remains is to adjust it to thorough co-operative useful

ness.

No doubt that entire isolation from the ordinary citizen, of the soldier, when embodied for service, to which we have already alluded, renders many adjustments of professional functions to army purposes necessary, and renders them all difficult. A knot of men-at-arms, with the usual swarm of bill-men, archers, and pikemen, on an expedition across the English border, or scouring the Flemish homesteads, would have felt a following of quartermasters, commissaries, purveyors, and even surgeons, to he thorough impedimenta. The functions of all but the surgeon they could do better for themselves. Of the surgeon, almost the only representative would be the friar, or other religious person who visited the field, to impart to the wounded what medical skill he possessed, along with

the consolations of religion. But a hierarchy of medical officers, from a director-general, through divers grades of inspectors, to the regimental surgeons and their assistants, would have astonished Douglas or Hotspur about as thoroughly, perhaps, as a proposal to establish` an army sanitary staff.

There is no doubt that it is extremely difficult-and, in fact, this difficulty is at the root of the whole of the other difficulties of our army service to get persons whose pursuits are not combative to co-operate in military operations. The command and obedience, to which our citizens are so little accustomed, is the vital spirit of an army. It is sometimes necessary, and oftener natural, that it should extend beyond the pure military body to whatever other class comes in collateral connection with it. The propensity of the military commander is to brigade everything over which he has power. It is sometimes as difficult to impress on an old soldier the existence of possible duties which consist neither in command nor obedience, but in separate co-operation and individual action, as it was to demonstrate to the Persian ambassador that the Emperor of Hindostan was a company with a Board of Directors, and a chairman and deputy chairman. Perhaps the most flagrant instance on record of the collateral application of military organisation was exhibited by the Duke of Alva, who, in his campaign in the Netherlands, embodied the liberal damsels who, from time immemorial, have accompanied armies, so that, as Sir James Turner describes it, They had their several captainesses and alfieras, or she cornets, or other officers, who kept among them an exact discipline in all points that concerned their profession; they were divided into several squadrons, according to their quality, and that was distinguished no otherwise but by the difference of their beauties, faces, and features." This was a caricature of a practice, inveterate, but to some extent necessary. In despotic countries, where every man's position is adjusted by royal warrant, it is no doubt more easily dealt with than

among us.

66

The position and functions of the medical staff form the most important of all the matters to be adjusted between the combative and noncombative portion of our armaments, and to these alone shall we limit the few remarks we have to offer. There has been, no doubt, a sluggish tardiness in the mind of the world to acknowledge the true grandeur of the medical profession, when dutifully and honestly pursued: alas! we are all of us sufficiently conscious of the physician's power over us, when he cautiously closes the door of the sick-room, and we watch the glance of his eye or the wrinkles of his mouth for the faintest reflection of those inner thoughts, in which the issues of life and death may be already prejudged. But the careless and the healthy world is apt, perhaps, to forget the true elevation of the untitled and unrobed master of science.

As to the army medical man, perhaps the earliest notice of his estimation is in Homer, who tells of the kind anxiety of the Greek host when they found that Esculapius's son, Machaon, was wounded by a random dart, and of his careful removal on shipboard

Ιητρὸς γὰρ ἀνὴρ πολλῶν ἀντάξιος ἄλλων. Passing to later incidents not far from the same place, we have no doubt that the feeling of the poor sufferers in the Crimea towards their surgeons is unexaggerated by Mr Rawlinson, a civil engineer, sent out on the sanitary commission, already referred to. Having been wounded, he had to be surgically treated in the front-an opportunity of observation which a civilian rarely obtains, or is anxious to obtain; and he says, "I can state that in that division in which I lay, from the officers to the men, the medical officers, if I may use so strong a term, were almost worshipped-idolised."

Yet throughout the late inquiries, now embodied in so alarming a library of blue-books, there is ever perceptible a continuous tissue of dissatisfaction with their position and functions, among the medical men of the army, and at the same time a demand, on the part of other people, for their performance of func