Toward the end of his life, he used to boast that he had performed upwards of one hundred thousand vaccinations. So far as vaccination prevailed in London, it was chiefly through Walker’s exertions; and he was just the character, being set going, to keep going whatever the adverse evidence or obloquy. He had his plans and his methods, and those who tried to modify them took nothing by their pains. He was a man to have his own way, and those who did not like him might leave him. Whether from incapacity or affectation, he made no attempt at politeness, and said precisely what he thought without accommodation. He was a piece of mechanism rather than of genial humanity.
FOOTNOTES:
[185] The Vaccine Scourge containing the New Beggar’s Opera alias the Walkerian Farce, alias the London Vaccine Hoax; in answer to Dr. Walker’s Jenneric Opera. A Rod for the Fool’s Back. London, 1815. Pp. 122. Price 3s.
[186] A Caution against Vaccine Swindlers and Imposters. By John Ring. London, 1816. Pp. 140.
[187] The Life of John Walker, M.D., Graduate of the University of Leyden; Licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians of London; and late Director of the Royal Jennerian and London Vaccine Institutions. By John Epps, M.D., London, 1831. Pp. 342.
[188] John Walker’s Reply to James Moore. London, 1818. Pp. 16.
[189] John Walker’s Reply to James Moore on his Mis-Statements respecting the Vaccine Establishments in the Metropolis and their Officers and Servants both Living and Dead. London, 1818. Pp. 114.
[CHAPTER XXV.]
JENNER’S LATER WRITINGS.
Jenner’s later writings were chiefly apologies for the failures of vaccination. His position was one of much difficulty, and its peculiarity is rarely, if ever, recognised. For example, how few know that his Inquiry published in 1798, “that master-piece of medical induction,” according to Mr. John Simon, was kept out of print and referred to as rarely as possible after 1801-2.