Although Magendie is rightly considered the true initiator of
experimentation upon living beings, the practice of vivisection is as
old as science itself.
Galien, the physician of Marcus Aurelius (in the second century of the
Christian era), dissected living animals, and yet he is regarded as
having merited his name (_Galenus_, "gentle") from the mildness of his
character. Five centuries before him, under the Ptolemies, Egyptian
experimenters had operated upon condemned persons. So, then, vivisection
is not, as usually thought, a diabolical invention of modern science.
[Illustration: Fig. 1-5 APPARATUS USED IN VIVISECTION.]
In all ages the necessity has been recognized of operating upon animals
that are nearest allied to man, such as the monkey, the hog, and the
dog, and who share with the king of creation the privilege of eating a
little of everything. Claude Bernard, however, had another way of
looking at things. It is true that he especially made researches into
the general laws of physiology, the secret of the vital functions, and
the operation of the various organic systems that constitute living
matter, but his immediate object was not to furnish weapons for the art
of curing. He left to physicians and surgeons the care of drawing
conclusions from his great work in biology, and of acting experimentally
upon animals allied to man in order to found a rational system of
therapeutics. So he preferred to operate upon beings placed low in the
animal scale--the frog especially, an animal that has rendered him
greater service than even man himself could have done. Cold-blooded
animals offer, moreover, the advantage of being less impressionable than
others, and the experiments to which they are submitted present more
accurate conclusions, since it is not necessary to take so much account
of the victim's restlessness. And then it is necessary in many cases to
choose subjects that possess endurance. The unfortunate frog, so aptly
named "the Job of physiology," becomes resigned to living under most
dreadful conditions, and when, through sheer exhaustion, he has
succumbed, his twitching limbs may still he used as an object of
experimentation for twenty-four hours. Thanks are due to nature for
giving so extraordinary a vitality to the tissues of a modest
batrachian! We owe to it the famous experiment of Galvani that led Volta
to the discovery of the pile and what followed it, the astonishing
conquests of electricity and those more marvelous ones still that are
now in their dawn. Science is much indebted to the frog, and may the
homage that we pay him help to alleviate the sufferings that have been
imposed upon this brave animal!
[Illustration: Fig. 6-8 APPARATUS USED IN VIVISECTION.]
The simple fact that we have just enunciated pleads loudly enough for
the cause of vivisection to make it useless to defend it. No one,
however, has risen to ask for an absolute proscription of it, but it is
only desired that the abuse of an abominable practice shall be curbed.
Does the abuse exist? That is the question, and it may be answered in
the affirmative. Yes, we do sometimes impose useless sufferings upon
animals. It is a culpable folly, a beastly cruelty, to constantly repeat
barbarous experiments with the object of exhibiting a well known
physical fact, a hundred times verified and always the same, when it
would only be necessary to enunciate it. But this is not the place to
expatiate upon the subject. After proclaiming the utility of
vivisection, we give it as our opinion that the practice of it should be
confined within narrow limits. It is not too much to ask that it be
confined to the privacy of laboratories, with the exclusion of visitors,
and to require from students a diploma guaranteeing their knowledge and
giving a programme of researches to be made. It is useless to seek in
the living what a study of the corpse reveals in all its details.
[Illustration: Fig. 9-11 APPARATUS USED IN VIVISECTION.]
And now, after these preliminary remarks, we present herewith a series
of cuts representing the various apparatus used in the practice of
vivisection, which are taken from a recent work by Claude Bernard. Fig.
1 shows the mode of muzzling a dog with a strong cord placed behind an
iron bit. Fig. 2 shows a method of tying a dog. Fig. 3 is a vessel in
which hares or cats are placed in order to anæsthetize them. Fig. 4
shows the mode of fixing an animal on its side, and Fig. 5 the mode of
fixing him on his back. Fig. 6 shows a dog fixed upon the vivisecting
table, and Fig. 7 a hare secured to the same. Fig. 8 exhibits the
general arrangement of a vivisecting table, properly so called. Fig. 9
shows (1) an anæsthetizing muzzle applied to a dog, and (2) the
extremity of the apparatus in section. Fig. 10 shows how the muzzle is
applied for anæsthetizing, and gives the details of construction of the
chloroform box. Fig. 11 exhibits the arrangement of the apparatus used
for holding the animal's jaws open upon the vivisecting
table.--_L'Illustration_.
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