( 2) Dr. Jenner's primary investigation of the principles of vaccination began in 1775, but was not satisfactorily completed in England until five years later. Lady Montagu had, however, introduced from Turkey into England, as early as 1717, inoculation for smallpox, but from the beginning it met the fiercest opposition of physicians, the clergy, and the superstitious public, which was never entirely overcome in England or America.
( 3) John Uri Lloyd, Ph.M., Ph.D. (Cin.), the distinguished author and scientist and collector of medical, etc., books, in an article printed in the Am. Jour. of Pharmacy, January, 1898, on "Dr. Peter Smith and His Dispensatory," says his book was the "first Materia Medica 'Dispensatory' published in the West."
( 4) Owing to its remarkable character we quote from his book:
"In South Carolina I was once in company with old Dr. Dilahoo, who was noted for great skill and experience, having traveled into many parts of the world. In the course of our conversation I asked him what he conceived the plague to be, which had been so much talked of in the world. He readily told me that it was his opinion that the plague is occasioned by an invisible insect. This insect floating in the air, is taken with the breath into the lungs, and there it either poisons or propagates its kind, so as to produce that dreadful disease. This, he was confirmed, was likely to be the truth from the experiments frequently made at Gibraltar. For there, said he, they of the garrison, when they fear the plague, have a way to elevate a piece of fresh meat pretty high in the air; they put it up at night, and if it comes down sound and sweet in the morning, they conclude there is no danger of the plague. But if the plague is in the air, the meat will be tainted and spoiled, and sometimes almost rotten. He was further confirmed in his opinion of the insect, because in and about tobacco warehouses the plague has never been known. I will remark: Now it is well known that tobacco will prevent moth from eating our woolen clothes, if we pack but little of it with them, that is the moth cannot breed or exist, where there is a sufficient scent of the tobacco. This scent may be death to the invisible insects even after they are drawn in with the breath and fastened upon the lungs. This may account for tobacco being burned (as I have heard it), in many old countries, on a chaffing dish in a room, that the people of the house may take in the smoke plentifully with their breath, to preserve their health and prevent pestilential disorders.
"Agreeable to this view, we may conclude that all tainted air may bring disease and death to us. And the plague has never been (properly speaking) in America as we know of. Yet other effluvia taken in with the breath may have occasioned other fearful diseases, such as the yellow fever and other bilious and contagious complaints." —P. 14.
( 5) His grandson, James Johns, in the 30's, wandered, as a trapper, to the Pacific coast, thence north to the mouth of the Willamette River on the Columbia (Oregon), and there lived a bachelor and alone until his death, about 1890. He was neither a fighting man nor a hunter. He travelled, often alone, wholly unarmed, among wild, savage Indians, his peaceable disposition and defenceless condition being respected. He, it is said, would not sell his lands at the mouth of the river, and thus forced the city of Portland to be located twelve miles from the Columbia.
( 6) My father was not a large man, his weight being only about one hundred and sixty pounds and height five feet, ten inches, but my mother, while only of medium height for a woman, was of large frame and weighed about one hundred and eighty pounds.
( 7) Solitary reading law, with time for thought and reflection, has its advantages, more than compensating for the opportunity to consult reports, etc., usually enjoyed by a law student in an office.
The present Chief-Justice (Hon. David Martin) of Kansas, though nominally a law student of mine, yet read and mastered the elementary and principal law-books while tending, as a miller, a dry-water country grist-mill, remote from my office.
( 8) On the recommendations of Generals Grant and Meade I was appointed (1866) by President Johnson a Lieutenant-Colonel in the 26th Infantry, U. S. A., one of the new regular regiments provided for after the close of the war. I declined the appointment because I was of too restless a disposition and not educated for a soldier in time of peace.