washed the clothes of the bed on which he slept and afterwards had leprosy. This was the first case in Neguac. It is possible that other patients may have visited Cape Breton to see the same person and this may account for the presence of the disease in that locality. Frank Sonier did not reach Cape Breton, having found himself too ill to proceed. It was not until a number of people who were intimate with the Soniers had taken the disease that public attention was drawn to it and the Lazaretto on Sheldrake Island in the Miramichi River was established. This was in the year 1844. At the same time or, it is said by many, previous to the appearance of the disease in Tracadie, Mrs. Gardiner in the Miramichi District, fifty-five miles from Tracadie, contracted the disease. A man named Moore in the same district also suffered from it. These were followed by Stewart and the Tingleys. McComb, of Miramichi, afterwards took the disease. It is said that he contracted it in Tracadie while working in the lumber camps. Some of the latter were natives of the United States.

"There are a number of families of the same name still living in Acadia, in Westmoreland County. If the disease is hereditary it is very strange that there should have been no cases of leprosy among them as well as among those in Tracadie where the disease was so abundant. Against the argument of the endemicity of the region there exist along the Gulf Coast many people of the same customs, religion, occupations and conditions, who are entirely free from leprosy."

Dr. A. C. Smith, the present physician-in-charge of the Leper Home at Tracadie, N. B., does not believe the usual history of leprosy in his section, and relates the first case as one Marie Brideau. He, as well as the writer is anxious to see the question properly settled upon some other basis than that of tradition, which has hitherto obtained.

In Louisiana, the disease has had special centers for a number of years, occurring in certain families and their connections. It is quite possible when the records of municipal government from 1730 to 1800 can be investigated that the names of the original inmates of the leper hospital may be ascertained. That there were several of them the letter of Dr. Giovellina* in 1800, to the Cabildo, would imply. He speaks of seven and refers to the inadequate measures for their care and for the public protection.

*First quoted by the writer in a paper before the Lepra Conference in Berlin, 1897. Loc. cit.

The subject is interesting and we are unwilling to do more at this time than to call attention to the inaccuracy of the present information on the subject very largely based and colored by the history of Charles Gayarré, who, in his earnest desire to tell the story, used doubtful references, themselves evidently based in large part upon tradition.

When the investigation justifies, the writer proposes elaborating the story of leprosy in Louisiana either confirming or refuting the hitherto by no means clear Acadian origin, endeavoring to trace the disease to the fountain head. The knowledge that leprosy prevailed in Continental Europe, and to some extent in France as late as the sixteenth century, makes it more than likely that the Colonies were peopled with leprous subjects, and it is more than probable that Louisiana gathered its disease from various quarters, especially as New Orleans was then one of the seaports of the New World.

THE POPES AND THE HISTORY OF ANATOMY.*

By JAMES J. WALSH, PH.D., M.D., LL.D.,

Lecturer on General Medicine at the New York Polyclinic School and Hospital Professor of Physiological Psychology at St. Francis Xavier College,

New York City.

It is asserted in practically all encyclopedia articles on the history of anatomy, that as a consequence of a Papal Bull issued about 1300 forbidding the mutilation of the human body, all direct dissection and, consequently, all opportunity for true progress in anatomy was hampered during several important centuries in the history of modern science. This presumed Papal prohibition is claimed to have precluded all possibility of the proper acquisition of anatomical knowledge until the beginning of the sixteenth century, when the golden age of modern anatomy set in.

It may be stated at once that notwithstanding almost universal concordance on the part of writers of the history of anatomy in English, there are no good grounds for saying that the bull issued by Pope Boniface VIII was directed against the practice of human dissection. More than this it is very clear from the

*Copyright, 1903, by The Messenger. Published by permission and with acknowledgment of the courtesy of The Messenger.-ED.

history of anatomy itself that this Papal document was not by any misunderstanding assumed by ecclesiastical authorities to forbid dissection. In fact the practice of dissection can be traced at all the Italian universities during the two centuries in which the bull was supposed to have its deterrent effect; and these universities it must be noted were everywhere directly under the control of churchmen. During the fourteenth century the Popes took up their residence in Avignon. This brought them into intimate relations with the university of Montpellier, and yet during their stay here the practice of dissection was not only not forbidden, but actually became one of the standard features of the university teaching, and special arrangements were made with the permission of ecclesiastical authorities by which the bodies of criminals were handed over to the medical department of the university to be treated as anatomical material.

The story of the misunderstanding (to call it by no harsher name) by which the tradition that dissection was forbidden by a Papal bull, became one of the stock fundamental principles of the history of anatomy, is not without interest as a sidelight on history. As a matter of fact, so far as I know, there is not a single history of medicine published in English which does not give at least some credence to the supposed Papal prohibition. This is not the first time, in history, of course, that by cumulative cross references without any attempt to verify the original authority, a groundless presumption has been bolstered up so as to look like an inexpugnable historical detail. The present case is a flagrant example of quotation without scrutinizing confirmation of the original authority quoted, such as will be quite familiar to those who have had much to do with modern history as it relates to the Church.

Careful search of medical historical literature seems to show that the basis of the whole misapprehension is to be found in what would usually be considered an absolutely unexceptionable authority, since it is a history presumably written by Church men. It is no wonder under the circumstances that the significance falsely attributed to the bull has been accepted without much question by subsequent writers.

In the Histoire Littéraire de la France, that precious work which we owe to the historical foresight and faithful labors of the Benedictines of the Congregation of Saint-Maur, and which contains so much that is of interest for the original materials of French history, there is a very definite assertion that the bull

of Boniface VIII was accepted by the generations immediately following its issue as forbidding dissection.

The passage is as follows: "But what was to retard still more (than the prohibition of surgery to the clergy mentioned in the preceding paragraph) was the very ancient prejudice which opposed anatomical dissection as sacrilegious. By a decree inserted in Le Sexte, Boniface VIII forbade the boiling of bodies in order to obtain skeletons. Anatomists were obliged then to go back to Galen for information and could not study the human body directly, and consequently could not advance the science of bodily health nor of therapeutics."

It is evidently from these declarations that all of the errors and misconceptions as to Papal prohibition of dissection have arisen. While the Histoire Littéraire de la France was commenced by the Benedictines of Saint-Maur, many of the volumes were completed after the revolution by members of the Institute of France. The sixteenth volume (from which our quotation comes) was mainly written by Daunou, the distinguished French historian, and it is to him that we owe this passage. While Daunou was an authority in the literary history of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries as well as in the political details of the time, he was not so situated as to be familiar with the medical history. He seems to have found this bull of Boniface VIII, which does not occur in Le Sexte itself, as he says, but in an appendix to this compilation of Boniface's bulls, and he concluded after reading it that this must have had an influence in preventing the preparation of skeletons and other procedures that would be of use in the study of anatomy.

Through the kindness of Rev. D. A. Corbett, of the Seminary of St. Charles Borromeo, Overbrook, Philadelphia, I have been able to secure the original bull and determine against what its prohibitory propositions were directed. Father Corbett writes:

"The 'Bull De Sepulturis of Boniface VIII' is not found in the Collectio Bullarum of Coquelines, nor is it incorporated in the Liber Sextus Decretalium Divi Bonifacii Papæ VIII, though it is from here that it is quoted in the Histoire Littéraire de la France. It appears in an appendix to this sixth book among the Extravagantes, a term which is used to signify that the documents contained under it were issued at a time somewhat apart from the period which the special book of decretals was supposed to cover. The Liber Sextus was published in 1298. This 'Bull De Sepul

turis' was not issued until 1300. It is to be found in the third book of the Extravagantes, Chapter 1."

The title of the bull, which like the title of any law, shows what is contained therein makes it clear at once that it has no reference to dissection. It runs thus:

"Persons cutting up the bodies of the dead, barbarously cooking them in order that the bones being separated from the flesh may be carried for burial into their own countries, are by the very fact excommunicated." ""* (The entire bull will be found in the foot-note.)

*De Sepulturis, Bonifacius VIII. Corpora defunctorum exenternantes, et ea immaniter decoquentes, ut ossa a carnibus separata ferant sepelienda in terram suam, ipso facto sunt excommunicati.

CAP. I. Detestandae feritatis abusum, quem ex quodam more† horribili nonnulli fideles improvide prosequuntur, nos piae intentionis ducti proposito, ne abusus praedicti saevitia ulterius corpora humana dilaceret, mentesque fidelium horrore commoveat, et perturbet auditum, digne decrevimus abolendum. Praefati namque fideles hujus suae improbandae utique consuetudinis vitio intendentes, si quisquam ex eis genere nobilis, vel dignitatis titulo insignitus, praesertim extra suarum partium limites debitum naturæ persolvat, in suis, vel alienis remotis partibus sepultura electa; defuncti corpus ex quodam impiae pietatis affectu truculenter exenterant, ac illud membratim, vel in frusta immaniter concidentes, ea subsequenter aquis immersa exponunt ignibus decoquenda. Et tandem (ab ossibus tegumento carnis excusso) eadem ad partes praedictas mittunt, seu deferunt tumulanda. Quod non solum Divinae majestatis conspectui abominabile plurimum redditur, sed etiam humanae considerationis obtutibus occursit vehementius abhorrendum. Volentes igitur (prout officii nostri debitum exigit), illud in hac parte remedium adhibere, per quod tantae abominationis, tantaeque immanitatis, et impietatis abusus penitus deleatur, nec extendatur ad alios; Apostolica auctoritate statuimus, et ordinamus, ut cum quis cujuscumque status, aut generis, seu dignitatis exstitent: in civitatibus, terris, seu locis, in quibus catholicae fidei cultus viget, diem de caetero claudet extremum circa corpora defunctorum hujusmodi abusus, vel similis nullatenus observetur, nec fidelium manus tanta immanitate foedentur. Sed ut defunctorum corpora sic impie, ac crudeliter non tractentur, et deferantur ad loca in quibus viventes eligerint sepeliri, aut in civitate, castro, vel loco ubi decesserint, vel loco vicino ecclesiasticae sepulturae tradantur ad tempus, ita, quod demum incineratis corporibus, aut alias ad loca ubi sepulturam eligerint, deportentur, et sepeliantur in eis. Nos enim si praedicti defuncti executor, vel executores, aut familiares ejus, seu quivis alii cujuscumque ordinis, conditionis, status aut gradus fuerint etiam si pontificali dignitate praefulgeant, aliquid contra hujusmodi nostri statuti, et ordinationis tenorem praesumpserint attentare defunctorum corpora sic inhumaniter et crudeliter pertractando, vel faciendo pertractari excomunicationis sententiam (quam exnunc in ipsos plurimus) ipso facto se moverint incur+ Alias, modo.