rom St. Petersburg, by Sir W. Creighton. Dr. Walker, who was sent from
St. Petersburg to Moscow, by our ambassador at the former place; states,
in his first report, dated in March, that the medical men seemed to
differ on the subject of contagion, but adds, "I may so far state, that
by far the greater number of medical men are disposed to think it not
contagious." He says, that on his arrival at Moscow, the cholera was
almost extinct there; that in twelve days he had been able to see only
twenty-four cases, and that he had no means of forming an opinion of
his own as to contagion. In a second report, dated in April from St.
Petersburg, this gentleman repeats his former statement as to the
majority of the Moscow medical men not believing the disease to be
contagious (or, as the College prefer terming it, infectious), and gives
the grounds on which their belief is formed, on which he makes some
observations. He seems extremely fair, for while he states that,
according to his information, a peculiar state of the atmosphere "was
proved by almost every person in the city (Moscow), feeling, during the
time, some inconvenience or other, which wanted only the exciting cause
of catching cold, or of some irregularity in diet, to bring on cholera;"
that "very few of those immediately about the patients were taken ill;"
that he "did not learn that the contagionists in Moscow had any strong
particular instances to prove the communication of the disease from one
individual to another;" and that he had "heard of several instances
brought forward in support of the opinion (contagion), but they are not
fair ones:" he yet mentions where exceptions seem to have taken place as
to hospital attendants not being attacked, but he has neglected to tell
us (a very common omission in similar statements), whether or not the
hospitals in which attendants were attacked were situated in or near
places where the atmosphere seemed _equally productive of the disease
in those not employed in attending on sick_. This clearly makes all the
difference, for there is no earthly reason why people about the sick
should not be attacked, if they breathe the same atmosphere which would
seem to have so particular an effect in producing the disease in others;
indeed there are good reasons why, during an epidemic, attendants should
be attacked in greater proportion; for the constant fatigue, night-work,
&c., must greatly predispose them to disease of any kind, while the