CHAPTER III.. "such Devils Would Pull Angels Out of Heaven,

"Such devils would pull angels out of heaven, Provided they could reach them; 'tis their pride; And that's the odds 'twixt soul and body-plague! The veriest slave who drops in Cairo's street, Cries, 'Stand off from me,' to the passengers; While these blotched souls are eager to infect, And blow their bad breath in a sister's face, As if they got some ease by it."

If the reader views with disgust and horror the above rules of ordinary practice in man-midwifery--and what man is base enough (save an accoucheur) not so to regard them?--these feelings will be intensified a thousand-fold by the contemplation of the latest invention of "obstetric art." We allude to the SPECULUM. The adoption of this instrument, as we are informed, is now becoming general; and its employment plunges its wretched victim, woman, down into the lowest deep of infamy and degradation. We will not pollute our pages by describing its method of action; suffice it to say, that, to the sense of touch, common to all midwifery practice, is added, in its application, that of sight; exposure the most complete of all which modesty, even in the most abject of races, invariably conceals.

THE SPECULUM]

In confirmation of our own view of this most villanous invention, we will convict its advocates by the testimony of distinguished members of their own profession. The denunciations of the speculum, by these morally-courageous men, addressed, for the most part, solely to their fellow-practitioners, shall now go forth to be read and pondered on by every reflecting Englishman who may chance to open these pages.

"We have already exposed, with our utmost vigour, the improper practice which Drs. Ashwell and Lee so strongly condemned. All we said on that occasion we repeat now.... To employ it (the speculum), as it is rumoured certain persons in London have employed it, to attract notice, and place themselves prominently before the public--to use it merely as a means of personal advancement--in fact, to gain practice--is a crime against the laws of morality, and treason against professional honour.

"The erroneous and one-sided opinions, which the advocates for the indiscriminate use of the speculum hold, prove how little they have presented to themselves the true facts of the case. Dr. Locock, who made the startling assertion that delicacy ought not to be considered in matters of disease, and was both for and against the speculum, said, that he looked into the vagina as he would into the throat. True enough, so far as he simply is concerned. He would look into the vagina as an ordinary matter of business, and think only of what, in the course of business, it might be necessary to do there. But would the woman regard it in this philosophical light? Is it the same to her whether her tongue is pressed down with a spatula, or her vagina distended with a speculum? Is her moral state to be left out of account altogether, and are we to treat the most sensitive organ in her frame as if it was so much inert matter, whose great use was to be cauterized?

"We do not hesitate to say, that no man, who regards properly his science and himself, can ever use this instrument without feeling that he is driven to it; that other means have failed, and that it has become necessary to adopt additional modes of investigation and of cure. And if it appear from the inquiries which will, doubtless, now be made--that the necessities for its employment have been knowingly exaggerated by its advocates, no condemnation can be too severe for so great a breach of scientific honour."--Medical Times, 8th June, 1850.

"Dr. Marshall Hall describes in the Lancet a new form of hysteria, connected with and caused by the abuse of the speculum. In his preliminary remarks, alluding to the manner in which the charge of indecency was received by one of the speakers at the late meeting of the Medico-Chirurgical Society, on the ground of the non-necessity of the exposure of the person, he says, 'But if there be no exposure of the person, is there, at first, no wounding of the feeling, and is there afterwards no deterioration and blunting of those feelings by the repeated daily or weekly use of the speculum vaginae in the virgin, and in the very young, even amongst the married?' He declares that there is such deterioration, and that the female who has been subjected to such treatment is not the same person, in delicacy and purity, she was before. Dr. Marshall Hall's declaration on this point is fully confirmed by the results of experience. The consequences of the abuse of this practice are, indeed, lamentable. Dr. Hall says he has known cases of the most revolting attachment on the part of the patients to the practice and the practitioner. The current of the ideas becomes hypochondriacally directed to the organs of generation. The very mind is poisoned. A new and lamentable form of hysteria is induced. The patients become reserved, and moody, and perverse, and speak unintelligibly in broken sentences; the peace and happiness of the family are broken up; subjects are discussed on the domestic hearth which ought never to be mentioned except in the sick room--words which wound are spoken, and thoughts which are derogatory are expressed by others, perhaps by the male, members of the family. Dr. Hall mentions cases in which the speculum has been repeatedly employed, and had induced this sad, wretched state, and yet no uterine disease existed. He believes the cases in which the young, and especially the unmarried, are afflicted, so as really to justify the use of the speculum, to be rare, and the cases in which the injection of a solution of nitrate of silver, by the patient herself, may not take the place of the application of this valuable remedy in substance by the hand of the practitioner, to be rare indeed. We heartily thank Dr. Marshall Hall for this additional blow at 'the pollution.' It is greatly to his credit."--Medical Times, 15th June, 1850.

"I have no doubt that I was one of a considerable number, who, at the last meeting of the Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society (a meeting which will long be memorable in its annals), wished to express their sentiments on the subject of the use of the speculum vaginae, without having what they deemed a perfect opportunity. I regret that the discussion was not adjourned to another evening.

"I think the profession deeply indebted to Dr. Robert Lee for bringing this question forward for discussion. It is not one of mere medical or surgical treatment, but of medical and public ethics; and I confess myself astonished at the light manner in which a vaginal examination was spoken of by one of the gentlemen present at the Society. I think the challenge of Dr. Bennet should have been accepted at once, and that a committee should have been, and should now be, appointed to test the existence, or the non-existence, of the thousand and one 'ulcers,' or 'abrasions,' of which so much has been said of late.

"The gentleman to whom I have alluded above, huffed the idea of indecency in making a vaginal examination. There need be no exposure of the person of the patient. Surgeons make no scruple about an examination of the rectum (as if the two examinations could, morally speaking, be compared). But, if there be no exposure of the person, and if the examination of the rectum be frequently made, is there, at first, no wounding of the feelings? and is there afterwards no deterioration and blunting of those feelings by the repeated daily or weekly use of the speculum vaginae in the virgin, and in the very young, even amongst the married? I loudly proclaim that there is such deterioration, and that the female who has been subjected to such treatment is not the same person, in delicacy and purity, that she was before.

"I have known cases of the most revolting attachment, on the part of such patients, to the practice and to the practitioner. I have known them to speak of the 'womb' and of the 'uterine organs' with a familiarity which was formerly unknown, and which, I trust, will, ere long, be obsolete. The current of the ideas becomes hypochondriacally directed to these organs. The very mind is poisoned. A new and lamentable form of hysteria--I had almost said of furor uterinus--is induced, with this aggravation, that the subject of distress is either concealed by the greatest effort, or explained at the expense of virgin or female modesty.

"There is a case of 'poisoned mind' in the male sex, induced by the quack doings of the day, relative to the existence of impotency, which all of us must have treated and deplored. A similar case of 'mental poisoning' is now being induced in the other sex, by the frequent, constant, and undue reference, on the part of the profession, to the condition of the 'uterine organs.'"...

"One poor, miserable patient comes to me weekly, thus afflicted. She has been treated by the speculum and the caustic for months, as an out-patient at University College Hospital. I sent her to Dr. Robert Lee twice. Twice that gentleman examined, and declared that there was no uterine or vaginal disease. Meanwhile the miserable patient's mind is absorbed by this ideal malady, and the peace of her husband's home is destroyed.

"I sent another patient to Dr. Robert Lee a few days ago (whom I had never seen) under similar circumstances, but moving in a different rank of life. The same opinion was given, the miserable patient suffering dire disappointment!

"I recently attended a poor curate's wife, who had come to London for medical aid, at, as I suppose, great inconvenience. During my short attendance, this patient was constantly urged by a friend, a titled lady (the aristocracy always take the lead in quackery), to send for her physician, who is a strong abettor of the speculum. The course which followed may be imagined, and need not be described. A case of more complicated misery for a husband cannot well be conceived. A sickly wife, afflicted with uterine hypochondriasis, set upon by a titled advocate of the uterine quackery, with straitened resources.

"The advocates of the speculum speak of cases which had resisted the efficacy of the usual general and local treatment, and which yielded to the use of the speculum and the caustic. I have seen cases in which, the speculum and caustic having been employed--and unduly employed, as I believe--the patient remained more miserably afflicted in mind and body than ever, and this the effect of that treatment. Whether the former supposition be as well founded as the latter, I will not presume to determine; but I believe the cases in which the young, and especially the unmarried, are afflicted, so as really to justify the use of the speculum, to be rare, and the cases in which the injection of a solution of nitrate of silver, by her own hands, may not take the place of the application of this valuable remedy in substance, by the hand of the practitioner, to be rare indeed.

"I will not advert even to the epithets which have been applied to the frequent use of the speculum by our French neighbours, who are so skilled in these matters; but I will ask, WHAT FATHER AMONGST US, AFTER THE DETAILS WHICH I HAVE GIVEN, WOULD ALLOW HIS VIRGIN DAUGHTER TO BE SUBJECTED TO THIS 'POLLUTION'? Let us, then, maintain the spotless dignity of our profession, with its well-deserved character for purity of morals, and throw aside this injurious practice with indignant scorn, remembering that it is not mere exposure of the person, but the dulling of the edge of the virgin modesty, and the degradation of the pure minds of the daughters of England, which are to be avoided." Dr Marshall Hall in the 'Lancet.'

Dr. Dickson, an eminent medical reformer, and accomplished surgeon and physician, formerly on the staff, and now, and for many years past, in extensive practice in London, says:--

"But of all the medical quackeries that have sprung up in these times, none can compare with the infamous speculum treatment of certain members of the faculty, who confine their practice principally to females. No matter what may be the woman's real complaint--a cough, pain of the side, or anything else--she is at once assured that it proceeds from 'disease of the womb.' A pretended examination must, forsooth, be gone through, which, in every case, is made to confirm the dishonest assurance given in the first instance. The patient is forthwith victimized, week after week, and month after month, with a host of operations, for a disease which, in the beginning, at least, never existed at all, but which is very soon brought on artificially by the horrible appliances of men, who ride in their carriages, by this daily and hourly outrage to the constitutions and the decency of our women."--The Forbidden Book, vol. ii. page 195.

Again, in the same work, appears the following letter, under the head of "Obstetric Quackery in Edinburgh:"--"SIR,--The members of the Town Council of Edinburgh are the patrons of the University. Most of them are known to be conscientious men, and keenly alive to all that can affect the honour and the usefulness of the institution over which they preside. It appears extraordinary that they should have remained so long unacquainted with the leprosy which has infected some of the professors; or that they should not have summarily driven these persons from the chairs they were polluting, when the fact was discovered.... It is to him (Dr. Simpson) that we chiefly owe the infinitely more dangerous and disgusting quackery in midwifery, which rages like a pestilence in London, and in every town and village throughout the empire, and in some of our most distant colonies. On the present occasion, it may be sufficient to enumerate the proceedings to which I allude: To Dr. Simpson we owe the invention of the dangerous weapon called the uterine-sound or poker--pessaries which have justly been designated infernal and impaling uterine machines, to cure retroversions which never existed; instruments for pumping the uterus, to excite menstruation; and the proposal to rub its inner surface with lunar caustic, for the same purpose. To him we owe the hysterotome, for slitting open the os uteri, to cure sterility; and to his efforts, more than any other individual, we are indebted for the profligate use of the speculum which has prevailed, and the practice of destroying the os and cervix uteri with caustic potash. To Dr. Simpson we owe the attempt to revive the brutal practice of turning in cases of distortion of the pelvis; of attempting to substitute the Caesarian operation for the induction of premature labour; to him we owe the attempt to subvert the established practice in placental presentation, by extraordinary statistic tables; and, lastly, we owe to the genius of the Professor of Midwifery in the University of Edinburgh, the baby-sucker! Are these specimens of what the Edinburgh Monthly Journal for this month calls 'the simple treatment taught and practised in Edinburgh, and which, if adopted in London, would reduce many practitioners from comfort to starvation?' We may well excuse the members of the Town Council if they are not so dexterous in harliquinade as the University Professor.--I am, Sir, your obedient Servant, ISAAC IRONS, M.D. Sept., 1851."

We now proceed to quote the words of "a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons," which appear in a pamphlet entitled, "The Speculum: its Moral Tendencies." We believe the author to be very well known, both as a writer in the medical periodicals, and as a skilful and accomplished surgeon. He says--"Were fame and fortune, however, the only results, were the public simply gulled, there would be nothing in its consequences to take this imposition out of the ordinary category. But, unfortunately, this is not the case. The practices of these men leave results of a far more serious and lasting character, not to be sought for amongst material things, but in the lowered and loosened state to which it is rapidly bringing the morality of the country.

"This is a strong assertion, but not stronger than the facts that support it. The profession is well aware of the baleful tendency of the proceedings of these men, whilst they deplore their inability to prevent or to expose them. Scarcely a member of it whom you meet but has a tale to tell of their practices, which, if made public, would bring the mighty from their seats; but there is too much indecency involved in the disclosure to allow of its publicity. Thus are they doubly hedged; their diploma checks suspicion, whilst the nature of their performances secures them secrecy.

"To believe in the necessity for this constant and general use of the speculum, is to admit a sad deterioration in nature itself. Either this, or that anterior generations were great sufferers without being aware of it. Perhaps, like the Spartan boy they endured in silence, rather than betray a want of courage, or, what was more laudable, a want of delicacy.

"But I do not believe in this. I believe the workmanship of the Creator to be as perfect now as of yore, and that the modern and multitudinous disorders attributed to the uterine system are wicked inventions put forth to sanction unnecessary interference. Why, if we are to believe these men, there is scarcely a patient who applies to them that is not suffering from one or the other of these numerous affections. The womb, with them, is so invariably out of order or out of position, that disease and dislocation are more constant than its normal conditions. Young or old, married or single, whatever their age, whatever their condition, the same opinion, the same treatment, varied only in the selection of the instrument. No matter what the complaint, or what the ailment, the fons et origo mali is declared to be the uterus....

"Nor are these practices confined to the high priests in these temples of immorality; faith in their professions now pervades a large portion of female society; like the flame in a stubble field the mania has spread, the convert quickly becomes the proselyte, and the consequence is, that some men, in the general practice of our profession, are induced to shape their treatment less by the nature of the complaints, than the suggestions of their patients....

"The result of this can be easily imagined; unskilfulness is associated with fraud. The Speculum is brought into play, and startling are the revelations made by its glittering wall. Alarmed or amused, no matter which, the patient is secured, and remains long enough under treatment to familiarize her with indecency, and to enable the practical hand of the neophyte to attain the tour de maitre, both in handling the instrument and the fee....

"Then again, these uterine complaints, contrary to the laws that govern local affections, are made to assume an almost epidemic character, for it is by no means uncommon to hear that several members of the same household are under treatment, as they call it, at the same time....

"But besides those whom I have mentioned as abusing the Speculum, there are others, who, more honest, yet not less dangerous, are, unconsciously perhaps, contributing their share to this work of demoralization; I mean that portion of the profession who, unable to form opinions for themselves, are ready at all times jurare in verba magistri, adopting any practice, provided the example be set in high places.... with these men one would like to deal charitably; but the best of motives must not be allowed to compensate the consequences of dangerous acts; THEY MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO JEOPARDISE THE MODESTY OF THE SEX, SO LONG THE PRIDE AND THE PROPERTY OF ENGLAND.

"That an instrument, capable in its application of such wide-spreading mischief, should possess some compensating good, some power whereby diseases, hitherto obscure and intractable, should be compelled to render up the morbid secrets on which they rest, and to take their place amongst curable disorders, was to have been expected, and had this been so, the case would stand far differently....

"But unfortunately this is not the case; the diseases here alluded to, though obnoxious to its application, instead of being benefited are materially aggravated by its use; take, for instance, the scirrhous affections, in these cases its use is not only inefficacious, but positively injurious--it only adds torture to torment....

"Driven, then, from the field of real disease, these advocates of the Speculum are obliged to invest with a false character ailments that the profession has hitherto regarded as too trifling to admit of any save the simplest treatment.... The Speculum has been greatly extolled as the means of conveying appliances immediately to the parts affected. But it must not be forgotten that the effects of local remedies in constitutional affections are short-lived in the extreme, or that those can hardly be called remedies, that are notoriously so slow in their operation, as to leave it doubtful whether they have not, after all, been robbing time of the merit of the recovery.

"That the profession is silent on these abuses is, in my opinion, to be deplored. Such silence may arise from the fear that the denunciation of them would tend to lower it in the estimation of the public, more than the continuance of the abuses themselves. Yielding to none in the desire to uphold the dignity of my order, I must say that I share in no such apprehensions. The public in return for the confidence they repose in us, have a right to such protection, and if they find that it has been withheld, that, in a mistaken solicitude for our own interests, we have neglected theirs, they will bind us all up in one common withe together, and the diploma, though it may still indicate the man of science, will cease to insure us the position of gentlemen."

The last extract which we shall give appears in the Lancet, a periodical whose very title is behind the age, indicative of professional bigotry, a record of antiquated fallacy and prejudice. The tide must surely be on the turn, or the exposure of these speculumizing villainies would never have been permitted to grace its columns:--

"On the use of the speculum in the diagnosis and treatment of uterine diseases, by Dr. Robert Lee, the author referred to the tabular statement of 220 cases of real and imaginary disease of the uterus, published in the 38th volume of the Medico-Chirurgical Transactions, and presented in a similar tabular form the details (of) eighty additional cases, which had since come under his observation. Of the 300 patients forty-seven were unmarried, one had barely completed her eighteenth year, several were under twenty, and the majority under thirty years of age, and were suffering from hysteria, leucorrhoea, dysmenorrhoea, or some nervous affection of the uterus, without inflammation, ulceration, or any structural disease or displacement of the organ. In Case 256 the patient had been told that the womb was prolapsed and much ulcerated, and an instrument had been introduced for six weeks, with an aggravation of all the symptoms. The hymen was found so perfect on examination that it was impossible to reach the os uteri without using an unjustifiable degree of violence. On the ground of morality, and on every other ground, he could see no defence for the employment of the speculum in these forty-seven cases. Of the 300 patients seventy were barren, and the sterility was not removed, nor the other symptoms relieved in a single instance. SEVERAL OF THESE INDIVIDUALS SPOKE WITH HORROR AND SHAME OF THE TREATMENT TO WHICH THEY HAD BEEN SUBMITTED. A considerable number of the cases were suffering from cancerous disease, in all of which the symptoms seemed to have been aggravated by the treatment. In Case 236 the character of the disease was unmistakable, but after an examination with the speculum a favourable prognosis had been given, and the actual cautery employed for months, and hopes of recovery held out to the last. The author expressed his conviction that neither in the living nor in the dead body had he ever seen a case of simple ulceration from chronic inflammation of the os or cervix uteri; and to apply the term to states of the os uteri in which the mucous membrane or, as it is termed by some, the basement membrane, is not destroyed by ulceration, was an abuse of terms calculated only to deceive and mislead the members of the medical profession, from whom the truth has been carefully concealed. The speculum emanates from the syphilitic wards of the hospitals at Paris, and it would have been better for the women of England had its use been confined to those institutions."--The Lancet, July 25, 1857.

Such is the language of earnest, honourable men, who have dared to dispel, by the light of true philosophy, the fog of "scientific" rascaldom--that empiric haze so desolating, so destructive to the inwrapped and blinded public. Few will deny that there are, in the foregoing extracts, sentiments which do honour to their authors, and revelations for which society should feel the deepest gratitude.

Were we to relate the numbers of weak and deluded creatures who, upon the slightest pretext, submit to this accursed rite, it would appear incredible. We know that one fashionable pretender to peculiar skill in the diagnostics of uterine affections, has boasted of five such examinations in one family in a single day! and that another has spoken of the exposure of fifty women to his professional gaze in the same space of time. These are facts--horrible, but undeniable, facts! "O shame! where is thy blush?" O woman! where is thy vaunted modesty, in a country tainted by such unspeakable and hideous mysteries, permitted--nay, tacitly encouraged--as they are, under the hypocritical guise of scientific discovery, and the pretended mitigation of human ills? Is it possible that in this age, and in this our land, men should be found so utterly insensate, so beggared of all feeling, so lost to all the chivalry of manhood, that, with this libidinous iniquity made patent, they would not arise, and, in one mighty and overwhelming surge of execration, crush its perpetrators, and abolish this obscene invasion of marital rights. No! perish the thought! The azure blood, which throbbed and pulsated in the British heart in those far off days of the second Richard, when the indecent outrages of the poll-tax gatherers lashed the people into fury at their daughters' wrongs, still runs in the veins of Englishmen; and we will not believe that the halo of purity, which made the homes of "merrie England" the watchword of our sires, can have departed for ever from those of their descendants.