The Mayor of Villers-Farlay, who had been to see Pasteur during the summer, wrote to tell him that this lad would die a victim of his own courage unless the new treatment intervened. The answer came immediately: Pasteur declared that, after five years’ study, he had succeeded in making dogs refractory to rabies, even six or eight days after being bitten; that he had only once yet applied his method to a human being, but that once with success, in the case of little Meister, and that, if Jupille’s family consented, the boy might be sent to him. “I shall keep him near me in a room of my laboratory; he will be watched and need not go to bed; he will merely receive a daily prick, not more painful than a pin-prick.”
The family, on hearing this letter, came to an immediate decision; but, between the day when he was bitten and Jupille’s arrival in Paris, six whole days had elapsed, whilst in Meister’s case there had only been two and a half!
Yet, however great were Pasteur’s fears for the life of this tall lad, who seemed quite surprised when congratulated on his courageous conduct, they were not what they had been in the first instance—he felt much greater confidence.
A few days later, on October 26, Pasteur in a statement at the Academy of Sciences described the treatment followed for Meister. Three months and three days had passed, and the child remained perfectly well. Then he spoke of his new attempt. Vulpian rose—
“The Academy will not be surprised,” he said, “if, as a member of the Medical and Surgical Section, I ask to be allowed to express the feelings of admiration inspired in me by M. Pasteur’s statement. I feel certain that those feelings will be shared by the whole of the medical profession.
“Hydrophobia, that dread disease against which all therapeutic measures had hitherto failed, has at last found a remedy. M. Pasteur, who has been preceded by no one in this path, has been led by a series of investigations unceasingly carried on for several years, to create a method of treatment, by means of which the development of hydrophobia can infallibly be prevented in a patient recently bitten by a rabid dog. I say infallibly, because, after what I have seen in M. Pasteur’s laboratory, I do not doubt the constant success of this treatment when it is put into full practice a few days only after a rabic bite.
“It is now necessary to see about organizing an installation for the treatment of hydrophobia by M. Pasteur’s method. Every person bitten by a rabid dog must be given the opportunity of benefiting by this great discovery, which will seal the fame of our illustrious colleague and bring glory to our whole country.”
Pasteur had ended his reading by a touching description of Jupille’s action, leaving the Assembly under the impression of that boy of fourteen, sacrificing himself to save his companions. An Academician, Baron Larrey, whose authority was rendered all the greater by his calmness, dignity, and moderation, rose to speak. After acknowledging the importance of Pasteur’s discovery, Larrey continued, “The sudden inspiration, agility and courage, with which the ferocious dog was muzzled, and thus made incapable of committing further injury to bystanders, ... such an act of bravery deserves to be rewarded. I therefore have the honour of begging the Académie des Sciences to recommend to the Académie Française this young shepherd, who, by giving such a generous example of courage and devotion, has well deserved a Montyon prize.”
Bouley, then chairman of the Academy, rose to speak in his turn—
“We are entitled to say that the date of the present meeting will remain for ever memorable in the history of medicine, and glorious for French science; for it is that of one of the greatest steps ever accomplished in the medical order of things—a progress realized by the discovery of an efficacious means of preventive treatment for a disease, the incurable nature of which was a legacy handed down by one century to another. From this day, humanity is armed with a means of fighting the fatal disease of hydrophobia and of preventing its onset. It is to M. Pasteur that we owe this, and we could not feel too much admiration or too much gratitude for the efforts on his part which have led to such a magnificent result....”