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ARMY MEDICAL  LIBRARY
FOUNDED 1836
WASHINGTON, D.C 
              REPORT

                      TO THE

SOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES
                  OF  AMERICA,


          VINDICATING THE  RIGHTS

                       OF

    CHARLES  T.  JACKSON

                      TO THE

DISCOVERY  OF  THE ANESTHETIC EFFECTS

                        OF

           ETHER  YAPOR,
                       AND

       DISPROVING THE CLAIMS OF W. T. G. MORTON

               TO THAT DISCOVERY.
PI SSENTED TO THE HOUSE OP REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES, ON THE 28th 01
                    AUGUST, 1852.
HON. EDWARD STANLY, OF NORTH CAROLINA, AND
   HON. ALEXANDER EVANS, OF MARYLAND,
MBERS OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE ETHER DISCOVERY.
       PRINTED BY AUTHORITY OF

. THE MINORITY OF THE COMMITT
 
/W. X>'si
  QV
  $78dr
    ISC;
         Boston :
Electrotyped and Printed by Rand, Avery, & Frye, 
REPORT.
   The undersigned, a member of the select  committee to whom the memorial
 of W. T. G. Morton, concerning the discovery of the anaesthetic  effects of
 sulphuric ether, was referred, dissenting from the conclusions, and still more
 from the tone and argument,  of the report of the majority, submits his views
 as to the facts and questions which were presented to the committee for inves-
 tigation.
   Mr. W. T. G. Morton  presented a memorial to Congress, praying,  in sub-
 stance, for an appropriation to him of money from the treasury of the United
 States, in consideration of the use by the  army and navy of his alleged dis-
 covery of the anaesthetic effects of sulphuric ether.
   Dr. Charles T. Jackson, having been informed by the committee of Morton's
 memorial and claim, presented his remonstrance against any appropriation of
 money to Mr. Morton for this purpose, upon the ground that the discovery of
 the anaesthetic effects of sulphuric ether  was not made by Mr. Morton, but by
 himself.   The main question at issue before the select committee to  whom the
 memorial and remonstrance were  referred, was, as  to  the relative  claims of
 Mr.  Morton and Dr. Jackson  to this discovery; for no doubt was entertained
 by any of the committee that a discovery had been made of inestimable benefit
 to the country and world.   The undersigned dissents from the conclusion of
 the majority upon this question.   He regards  the  report as  having  nothing
judicial in its  character, and as a  partisan  argument in defence of  Mr. Mor-
 ton's pretensions.   It rejects all the testimony of  the many unimpeachable
 witnesses as to the main facts  in support  of Dr. Jackson's claim. It admits the
 statements of witnesses, in behalf of Mr. Morton, who have been impeached and
 contradicted.   It assumes that the statements of Dr. Jackson, whose character
 is above all reproach, are entitled to no credit, and conveys  the impression
 that  he is a mere pretender.  It  gives implicit  confidence to the declarations
 of Mr. Morton, notwithstanding  the evidence which has  been submitted to
 show his bad character, and his  own contradictory statements.  It suppresses
 the material  facts in the case, and presents conclusions at variance with the
 highest evidence.   It gives judicial  weight to the  partisan  papers  of Mr.
 Morton's advocates,  and rejects the concurrent decisions of the highest scien-
 tific authority.
  The undersigned will hereafter refer  in detail to the particular portions of
the report which he considers objectionable, and will proceed, first, to an affirm-
ative  statement of the grounds upon  which he considers Dr. Jackson  entitled
r6 the sole honor of the discovery of the  anaesthetic  effects of sulphuric ether.
  In ^Stennining a question of discovery,  the character of the claimant is an
essential point of consideration.   The scientific  and intellectual character of
t ie claftnant may furnish the strongest  probability that scientific experiments
c: inductions were made by him, while, on  the other  hand,  an absence of those
387560 
4
attainments  and intellectual qualities,  which seem  a priori to be demanded
for a scientific discovery, may  present so high an improbability as to outweigh
the most positive testimony in  favor of the pretensions of the claimant.   Great
discoveries in science have  been never accidental.  The occasions which have
hastened or  aided the discovery may have been matters of accident; but if the
discovery were not premeditated or sought for, the knowledge of the relations
of the new fact, which accident has presented, with known truth, must have
existed.  Although the seed may be wafted by the wind, it will germinate and
bear fruit only in a cultivated and genial soil.   Knowing this to be truth as
to the past history of  scientific discovery, we naturally inquire, at the outset,
whether  the circumstances of  Dr. Jackson's life  and pursuits have been such
as to render it probable that he might have made the discovery of anaesthesia.
Some of these may be  briefly referred to.
  Dr.  Charles T. Jackson received the degree of Doctor of Medicine at Har-
vard University in 1829.  At  the time of his graduation he received from  the
Boylston Medical Society the premium for the best dissertation upon a medico-
chemical subject.  Embarking for  France, after  receiving  his medical degree,
he spent three years  in that country, engaged  in the study of medicine, in
attending lectures  at the Royal School of Mines, at the Academy of Sorbonnc,
and the College of France.  During the summer of 1832, at the request of
the  internes, he gave a course of  private instructions and lectures in surgical
anatomy.  On his return to  Boston,  he established himself in his profession
as physician and surgeon, in which he became eminently successful, especially
in surgery.   His  taste for researches in analytical chemistry  and  geology
gradually withdrew him from his  profession.  For many years past he  has
been almost exclusively employed as an analytical chemist and practical geol-,
ogist.  He  has  made  geological surveys of Maine,  Rhode Island and New;
Hampshire,  under  the authority of their respective  state governments.   Hej
made the first mining surveys on Lake Superior, and received the appointment*
of United States Geologist for the  survey of the mineral lands of that districti
The labors  of Dr.  Jackson  in chemistry and geology have given him a higll
place among the most eminent of our scientific men.                        \
  It  was the rare union of extraordinary medical and chemical attainments]
which peculiarly fitted him to make a discovery which  could not have origin]
ated with either the physician or chemist alone.   The  possession of these
attainments, and,  more than  all,  a rare intuitive  power of comprehending
scientific truths, have  led Dr. Jackson's friends to  consider him the man of
all others to have  made this discovery.
  Before proceeding to refer to the evidence by which the claims of Dr. Jack-
son are supported, the undersigned will briefly state the facts which appear to
him to be proved,  and define  the grounds upon  which he considers the claims
to discovery rest.
  1.  Dr. Jackson inferred, with great confidence, from  experiments performed
upon himself and  others, that, contrary to the opinion then universally enter-
tained by all  medical  authorities  on the subject, it is perfectly safe to inhale
sulphuric ether to such an extent as to produce unconsciousness.
  2.  He discovered the two  conditions on which the safety of etherization
depends; to wit, a due admixture  of atmospheric air, and the  purity of ether
from alcohol.   Ignorance of these  conditions had caused the failure of most of
the early experiments with ether, by the principal surgeons of  Paris  previo 13
to the publication of Dr. Jackson's communication to  the  French Ar>irl0™
dated Nov.  13th, 18 IB.                                          ^aaemy, 
5
   3.  Di\ Jackson discovered a new law of the human constitution,  to wit,
 that the  nerves of sensation may at pleasure be  safely and  completely  par-
 alyzed for  a  short time,  without the loss of consciousness, which state  always
 precedes  and follows the state of total unconsciousness produced by sulphuric
 ether, and which, by carefully regulating the administration of the ether,  may
 be produced  and continued for a considerable  time without  causing a  loss of
 consciousness.
   4.  He discovered  and verified, by an  experiment made  upon himself, — an
 experiment which, for boldness and  deliberate  courage, is  almost without par-
 ail lei in the history of science, — the physiological fact  that pure sulphuric
 ether duly  mixed with atmospheric air, has the power safely and completely to
 destroy exceedingly severe pain; and inferred, with great confidence,  that it
 has the power safely and surely to destroy any degree of pain.
   5.  He caused experiments to be made  under his directions,  and  on his
 responsibility, which verified his conclusion  as to the power of sulphuric ether
 to prevent  the pain of the severest surgical operations.
   The facts above stated are confirmed by the  most direct and unimpeachable
 testimony.
   The statements of a man of science, in relation  to experiments  made by
 himself,  which, by the nature  of  the case, must be solely within his  own
 knowledge, by the usage of the scientific world are  received with the highest
 (Confidence.    It is the occupation of his life  to investigate and announce truth.
 I lis precise habits of observation prevent error.   Great risks of life  and prop-
 erty are  hazarded upon his word.   The  habit of  accuracy  is cultivated  by the
 s>ense of responsibility under which he speaks.
 !  The first piece of evidence to be referred to, in support of the above positions,
 is, therefore, Dr. Jackson's own statement as to  his experiments and inductions.
 This statement, which he addressed to  the committee,  and is  the  same ad-
 dressed by  him to Baron Humboldt, will be found at length among the  papers
 ■ippended to this report.
   Dr. Jackson, after referring to experiments  made by him in the inhalation
 of various gases, and  particularly protoxide of nitrogen, with a view to determine
 i'ts effects in mitigating pain in surgical operations, states as follows:

   "Having been appointed geologist and chemist to the  State of Maine in
 1836, I opened a large chemical laboratory,  the next year,  for instructing my
 pupils, and for making the chemical analyses for the  State, and had  frequent
 occasion to experiment with  chlorine gas, and had accidents myself, as well as
 to my pupils, by the  breakage of vessels filled with this gas.  Vapor of alcohol
 was  at that time the  remedy we used for relief, and, not finding it to answer
 the purpose satisfactorily, I  soon  after tried the inhalation  of sulphuric ether
 vapor, which,  from  1837  to  1841, was the means in habitual  use  in my
 aboratory for relieving persons from the effect  of the action of chlorine in the
 uno-s.  *****
   "In the winter of  1841-42. I  made the  discovery of anaesthesia  by ether
 vapor.  *****
   "  The circumstances were as follows: — In  the winter of 1841-42,  I  was
■ mployed  to give a few lectures before the Mechanics* Charitable Association
in Boston, and in my last lecture, which  I think was in the month of Febru-
ary,  I had occasion to  show a number of experiments  in  illustration  of the
 theory of volcanic eruptions,  and  for my  experiments  I prepared a large
quantity of  chlorine  gas, collecting it in  gallon glass jars  over boiling  water.
Just as one of thest- large  jars was filled with  chlorine, it overturned and  broke,
 
6
and, in my endeavors to save the vessel, I accidentally got my lungs full of
chlorine gas, which  nearly suffocated  me, so that my  life was  in imminent
danger.   I  immediately  had ether  and  ammonia brought to  me, and  alter-
nately inhaled them  with great relief.
   " The next morning my throat was severely inflamed and very painful, and I
perceived a distinct flavor of chlorine  in my breath, and my lungs were still
much oppressed.   I  determined, therefore, to make a  thorough trial of the
ether vapor, and for  that purpose went into  my  laboratory which adjoins  myi
house in Somerset-street, and made the experiment, from which the discovery}
of anaesthesia was deduced.   I had  a large supply of perfectly pure-washecj!
sulphuric ether, which was prepared  in the laboratory of my friend,  Mr. Johrh
H.  Blake, of Boston.  I took a bottle of that  ether and a folded towel, andj
seated myself in  a  rocking-chair, placing  my  feet in  another  chair,  so  asj
to  secure a fixed  position as  I  reclined .backward in the one in which  I was
seated.  Soaking the towel in the ether,  I  placed it over my nose and mouth i
so as  to inhale the ether mixed with the air, and began to  inhale the vapor.'
deeply into  my lungs.   At  first the  ether made me  cough, but  soon that
irritability ceased, and I noticed a sense of coolness, followed by warmth, fulness
of the head and chest, with giddiness and exhilaration.   Numbness of the feet
and legs followed, and a swimming or floating sensation as if afloat in the fi;
This was  accompanied with  entire  loss  of feeling, even of contact with  tl
chair in which  I  was seated.   I noticed that  all pain  had  ceased in my
throat,  and  the  sensations which I had were of the most  agreeable kindj
Much pleased and excited, I continued the inhalation of the ether vapor, and!
soon fell into a dreamy state, and then became unconscious of  all surroundin;,
things.  I know not how long I remained in that state,  but  suppose it could,
not be less than a quarter of an  hour, judging from the degree of dryness of
the cloth, which,  during this state  of  unconsciousness,  had  fallen from  my
mouth and nose and  lay upon my breast.  As I  became conscious, I observe* I
still there was no feeling of pain in my throat, and my limbs were still  deeply
benumbed, as if the nerves of sensation were fully paralyzed.   A strange thril-
ling now began to be felt along the spine, but it was not in any way disagree-
able ;  little by little sensation  began to manifest itself, first in  the throat and
body, and gradually extended to the extremities, but it was  some time  before
full sensation returned, and my throat became really painful.
   " Reflecting upon these phenomena, the idea flashed into my mind that I had
made the  discovery I had been  for so long a time in quest of,— a means of
rendering the nerves of sensation temporarily insensible to pain, so as to admit
the performance of a surgical operation  on an individual without his sufferii
pain therefrom."
   Dr. Jackson explains  the  process of reasoning, upon  which he formed th
induction, as follows : —" In  the rapid inductions of the  mind it is not  alwa
easy to trace the  exact  method of  thought,  by which we suddenly arrive ;;•;
great truths; but  so far as I can trace the reasoning that rapidly flowed throuo-li
my mind,  it was  upon principles well understood  by all educated physicians
and physiologists.
   " I knew that the nerves of sensation were distinct from those of motion am".1
of organic life,  and that  one system  might be paralyzed without necessaril <-
and immediately affecting the  others.   I have seen often enough, in my medical
practice, the nerves  of  sensation paralyzed without  those  of .motion  heir-
affected, and those of motion  paralyzed without the ganglionic  nerves or tho?
of organic life being  affected. 
7
  " I knew also that the nerves of sensation are stationed as sentinels near the
exterior of our bodies, to warn us of danger from external causes of injury;
and that there is no feeling in the internal portion of our bodies.   I knew also
that when  the  knife is applied in  surgical operations, there is little sense of
pain in any parts beneath the skin.  This my own surgical experience, as well
as that  of others, had  long  ago  demonstrated, and  the philosophy of these
physiological facts was made known  to the medical world in England and this
country, by the researches  of Sir Charles  Bell, of  England, and was fully
proved by all eminent anatomists and physiologists of the continent of Europe.
  ' '• Now  I had observed —
  " 1st.  That the nerves of sensation in my own body were rendered insensi-
ble  to pain for some time before unconsciousness took place.
  " 2d. That all pain  had ceased  in a suffering part of my body during the
stages of etherization, preceding and following the unconscious state.
  " 3d. That this state of insensibility of the nerves of sensation continued for
a sufficient  length of time  to admit of  most  surgical operations, and  I had
reason to  believe that,  during the unconscious period, the  degree of insensi-
bility was still greater, so that it would be  impossible that any pain could be
felt in a surgical operation.
  "4th. That the nerves of motion and of the involuntary functions of respi-
ration and of circulation were in no wise affected ;  the functions of life going on
as usual, while the nerves of sensation were  rendered devoid of  feeling, and
the body could suffer no pain.  By long experience in the trial of ether vapor
in spasmodic asthma,  and  from numerous carefully-conducted physiological
experiments, I  had  learned  that the vapor of ether  could be  safely inhaled
into the lungs to an extent before believed to be highly dangerous."

  That the facts occurred and the deductions were made, as narrated  in Dr.
Jackson's statement above given, is proved by the testimony of eight  witnesses,
to whom he communicated the above facts,  and announced his discovery of the
anaesthetic effects of sulphuric ether, prior to September, 1846.   This testi-
mony is of  the same character as is  commonly introduced to establish priority
of invention in suits at  law for infringement of patents.   It  is believed that
it would establish the priority of invention or  discovery in  any court of law.
The witnesses are all men of unimpeachable character; most of them scientific
or  medical  men,  upon whom Dr.  Jackson's  statements must have made  a
strong impression, and who  would be most  likely to be distinct and definite  in
their recollections.
  The communications  by Dr. Jackson, relative  to  his  experiments and dis-
covery,  prior to September,  1846, were made as follows:
  In the winter of 1841-42, to George  Darracott.
  In the spring of 1842, to John  H. Blake.
  In the summer of 1842, to Wm. F. Channing.
  In  September, 1842, to S. A. Bemis.
  In September,  1842, to George T. Dexter.
  In 1842 or 1843, to Henry D.  Fowle.
  In November,  1845. to D. Jay Browne.
  In February,  1846, to Joseph Peabody.
  By the  testimony of Mr. Darracott, now published for the first time, we
have  the facts confirmed  in relation to the accident  from the inhalation of
calorine, and the inhalation of ether by Dr. Jackson to relieve  his sufferings.
This affidavit is as follows : 
   "I. George  Darracott, of Boston, in the County  of  Suffolk,.agent of the
Boston Gas Light Company, do under oath depose and say, that some years
ago, I called, in the  morning, at the laboratory of Dr. Charles T. Jackson in
Boston; that in the Doctor's manner I  perceived an unusual earnestness  or
excitement;  that in answer to my inquiry he said that  he came near killing
himself from accidentally breathing some  noxious gas—chlorine. I think it was
—which he was preparing to use in a lecture; that, to rid himself of the feeling
of suffocation he experienced, he inhaled the vapor of  sulphuric ether ;  that, as
the pain caused by breathing this n xious gas recurred, he again inhaled  the
sulphuric  ether, until he was completely  relieved.  The tir^e of this interview
was some years before any publication about etherization in the newspapers in
Boston.
                       " (Signed,)         GEORGE DARRACOTT."

  Mr. John H. Blake,  a practical  and' scientific chemist of Boston, in  his
letter of April 27,  1848, in replying to certain inquiries from Dr. Jackson,
says:

   " I distinctly remember  the substance  of the  conversation which passed
between us,  in  the spring of eighteen hundred  and forty-two, concerning sul-
phuric ether.   The conversation took place at your office, where I was passing
the evening.  Observing that you was suffering from severe pain in the head,
I was about  to take  leave,  when you requested me  not to do so,  remarking,
that in ten or fifteen minutes you would probably be  free from  pain.   I
replied:   ' Were I subject to attacks  so severe, and of such short duration,
I should inhale nitrous oxide.'  My remark was not  intended to be understood
seriously.   You answered :  ' Some of your sulphuric ether would be much
better;' and added,  'Are you aware that, when inhaled, it  produces  complete
insensibility?'—or words to this effect.
   " I was aware of this fact; but, at the  time, my impression was, that either
nitrous oxide or the vapor of ether, inhaled frequently, would be attended with
evil consequences, if not fatal.
   " The ether to which you  referred  was some  which I had prepared for use
in my private laboratory.   It was pure sulphuric ether, and very different from
the sulphuric ether of the shops—such as was then  only to be found in the
market."

  Dr.  William F.  Channing, of Boston,  a Fellow of the American Academy
of Arts and  Sciences, author of several works on Electricity and Magnetism,
and  lately distinguished as  the inventor of the celebrated Telegraphic Fire
Alarms, in his affidavit of May 12, 1848, says :

   "In the month  of March, in the  year  eighteen hundred and forty-six, I
accidentally  inhaled chlorine  in the laboratory of Dr. Charles T.  Jackson  of
Boston.   The effect was to produce spasms of  the chest and distress of respi-
ration, of such a character  as to make me apprehend  an immediately  fatal
result.  I at once inhaled the vapor of ammonia and alcohol from the mouth of
the vessels containing the same, for the purpose of neutralizing the chlorine
but  found very  slight  relief.   I also swallowed some brandy,  which  gave'
momentary,  but no permanent, relief.   Dr. Jackson, who had then returned  to
his office,  advjsed me to try the inhalation of sulphuric (hydric) ether wh:-*
he stated that he had himself used with success in an accident of the same kind 
9
 and he directed its application by means of a handkerchief.   The  inhalation
 of the ether produced an immediate suspension of the spasms, with entire relief
 from the distress.   They recurred again, after a time, with less violence, but
 were subsequently entirely removed  by occasional  inhalations of ether; so that,
 in about one hour after the accident,  I was enabled  to walk from the labora-
 tory  without difficulty.
   " Several days after,  inflammation  of the lungs resulted from the irritation
 of  the chlorine, connected with exposure to cold.  In consequence of the great
 relief produced in my own case by the inhalation of ether, I recommended it,
 shortly after my recovery, to be used as a remedy in ordinary cases  of spasms
 of the chest.
   "I have heard Dr. Jackson speak on several occasions of the inhalation of
 sulphuric (hydric) ether, for producing insensibility to pain during  operations
 of  a  surgical  nature.  These  conversations  with  Dr.  Jackson  took  place,
 according to my recollection, certainly more than a year and a half ago; and my
 own  impression is very strong that  the earliest communication on this subject
 took  place during  the summer or  autumn  of 1842, while I was  acting as
 assistant  with Dr.  Jackson on  the  geological survey  of the State of New
 Hampshire."
   Dr.  S.  A.  Bemis,  one of the oldest and most respectable dentists in Bos-
 ton,  deposes as follows :
   "On or about  the twenty-ninth day  of September, in the year eighteen
 hundred and forty-two, I  was residing as a boarder at the Mt. Crawford House,
 at  Hart's  Location, in the County of Coos,  and State of New Hampshire.
 On or about the said twenty-ninth day of September, Dr.  Charles T. Jackson,
 of  Boston, being  at that time  engaged in a geological survey of New Hamp-
 shire, stopped  at the 3aid Mt. Crawford House.
   " Dr. Jackson had, for some years prior to the above date, been an acquaint-
 ance  of mine.    During some conversation that occurred between Dr. Jackson
 and myself, at  the time and place above mentioned, and in presence  of several
 other gentlemen, among  them Dr. William F. Channing, of Boston, then an
 assistant of Dr. Jackson, various remarks were made respecting my own pro-
 fession ;  and the subject of pain and painful operations  was introduced by Dr.
 Jackson, as being incident to its practice.   Dr. Jackson then  remarked, that
 it was his wish to alleviate or destroy all sensation of pain and suffering during
 operations of a surgical nature, and  asserted that this result would be secured
 by the introduction of a new mode of practice in such operations.   After mak-
 ing several observations  upon the importance of some new treatment or  agent
 which would prevent  all consciousness of pain,  Dr.  Jackson said  that,  if I
 desired it, he would give or provide me with something which he knew would
 effect that object, and also, proposed to me to  introduce the same into my pro-
 fession.  I have no doubt, whatever, that the plan communicated to  me at the
 time was the same,  in regard to the substance to be used, viz., sulphuric ether,
 and in  all other respects, as  he  has since  promulgated  to the world.    Dr.
 Jackson also remarked, that he had been induced to try its effect upon him-
 self, when  suffering in consequence of some  accident, and that  he  had  been
completely successful in its application.  I had no doubt, at the time, that Dr.
Jackson regarded  the successful  application of the new  agent, above referred
to, to the purposes above  mentioned, as not only practicable, but quite within
the  grasp of the scientific operator; and I expected to meet with an account of
it at some future day through the scientific journals." 
10
   The following statement of Dr. George T. Dexter, now a practising physi
cian in the city  of  New York,  which has not been before  published, proves
the most precise and distinct announcement of this discovery by  Dr. Jaekson,
to him and others, and fixes the  time when Dr. Jackson  made a similar com-
munication to Dr. Channing:

                                            "New York, Dec. 9, 1851.
   " Dr.  Charles T. Jackson, —Dear Sir :   In reply to your  request, I most
cheerfully communicate to you what I know concerning  your discovery of a
means of preventing all sensation of pain in surgical operations, by the admin-
istration of 'ether vapor,' by pulmonary inhalation.
   "I distinctly remember that, while you were engaged in the geological sur-
vey of the State of New Hampshire,  in 1842, and while you  were exploring
the vicinity of Lancaster,  N.  H., at which  place I was at that time  practising
the profession  of medicine, you  communicated to me the  properties of strong
chloric ether, or  alcoholic solution of chloroform, as the means of arresting  the
pain of a decayed tooth ; I successfully employed it at that time by your advice,
you furnishing  me with the article employed.  I remember, when conversing
with you, that you also stated that you had  made  another and  more impor-
tant discovery,  namely, the production  of entire  insensibility  to  pain,  and
unconsciousness, by the inhalation into the lungs of pure sulphuric ether vapor;
and you then stated how you  made the  discovery,  and declared  it to be a
safe and efficient means of preventing all sensations of  pain  in all surgical
operations.
   " You spoke freely,  earnestly  and confidently of the discovery as a  means
of alleviating much human suffering.   All this time you rode with  me in  my
carriage to the town of Whitefield, for the  purpose of examining the farm of
Mr. Bray, and were employed most of the  time during  our  ride  in  giving me
an account of this most important discovery.
   " You remained at Lancaster several days, during which time you  were sent
for in consultation with myself by Gen. Ira Young, who was suffering  from a
diseased spine, accompanied with much pain ; and I distinctly recollect your
suggesting the employment of this  agent (ether) as the most effectual meana
of constraining the paroxysms of pain, and also giving the General an account
of the discovery.
   " During the winter of 1842,  I visited Boston, and called upon you at your
laboratory, and then asked you  what  progress  yon had made with  your dis-
covery.   You replied that you  had continued your  experiments,  and were
satisfied that it would prove all, if not more, than you expected.
   " I have communicated  my knowledge of these facts to several of my friends,
some time since,  and am happy to have it in my power  to reply to your letter
of inquiry, by stating these facts, which occurred at a  time that  must  satisfy
any disinterested person you  have, indeed,  priority  of  claim as well as merit.
I am residing now in this city, where I am practising my  profession, and shall
be happy to hear from  you at any time.   I omitted to say that the  manner
of administering  the ether  was by a sponge or handkerchief, and  also that Dr.
Wm. Channing was travelling with you as your assistant in  the survey.
                                   "I am,  sincerely,
                                           "Your friend,
                                               "GEO. T. DEXTER." 
11
  The  following deposition of Henry D. Fowle, one of the most respectable
druggists of the city of Boston, fully proves  that Dr. Jackson had discovered
the anaesthetic properties of ether as early, at least, as the spring of 1843:

   " I, Henry D. Fowle,  of Boston, in the County  of Suffolk, and Common-
wealth of Massachusetts,  Apothecary, depose and say, that my place of busi-
ness was, in  the years 1841 and 1842, in Green-street, in Boston, and near
the house then  occupied  by Dr. Charles T. Jackson, and that I was  in the"
habit of calling occasionally at his (Dr. Jackson's) laboratory.   At one of my
calls, in the  year 1841, he gave me a phial containing a very strong solution
of chloric ether,  prepared by himself, which, if applied to  a diseased  tooth, he
told me, was a sure  remedy for some kinds of toothache, and which  I  after-
wards  used as such  with entire  success.   Some  time  after  Dr.  Jackson
removed to  Somerset-street, I think  in  the year 1842,— certainly  not later
than the spring  of the  year 1843,— I called upon him at his house.   At this,
my first visit at  his new residence, I had  a long conversation with him,  partly
in his house  and partly at his laboratory, situated  near his  house.   In  this
conversation, the chloric ether  he  had formerly given me for the relief of the
toothache was referred to, and  Dr. Jackson then spoke of some other form or
kind of ether, different from  chloric  ether, the  inhalation of which,  he said,
would throw a person  into a state of unconsciousness, and  render him totally
insensible to pain.   Dr. Jackson further stated to me that he had made  this
discovery when suffering  from an  accidental inhalation of chlorine,  which
caused him great distress; that he then inhaled this  other kind of ether,  which
produced entire insensibility, and greatly relieved him.  Dr. Jackson thereupon
showed me a phial containing some pure ether, which he stated would produce
the effects above described.   I asked him if it was chloric  ether ?  He replied
in the negative,  and  stated that chloric ether could not be inhaled for  the pur-
pose of destroying pain, as it contained too much alcohol.
   " Dr. Jackson further said to me that he intended, at some future time, to
make more experiments with this ethereal vapor, and to subject its  power to
destroy the pain of surgical operations to a practical  test; but that his  atten-
tion was then so completely engrossed by the work connected with his geologi-
cal surveys, that he had  no leisure  for any other  researches.   Dr. Jackson
added in words to the  following effect: —' If you will come to me some time
hence, and inhale this ethereal vapor, you can have a tooth extracted or a liml
cut off without  pain, and without knowing anything about it.'   His declara-
tion appeared to me so extravagant and strange, that,  at  first,  I thought he
could not be  in earnest;  on finding, however,  that he spoke seriously,  and
actually meant what he said, the wonderful nature of the declaration,  together
with the air of confidence and sincerity with which he spoke,  made an impres-
sion on my mind which I  can never  forget.   I then urged Dr. Jackson to keej
this  discovery to himself, for it would prove  a  foftune to him;  and warned
him that, if he communicated it to others,  as freely as to  myself, it would be
stolen from him.
   " Subsequently, in the year 1846, and before  the 30th of September of that
year,  Dr. Jackson called at my shop, on  Prince-street, being  on his way to J.
H. Blake's chemist's office, on Bennet-street.  At this interview I referred to
the aforesaid discovery he had communicated to me.   Dr. Jackson then again
spoke with perfect confidence of the  power of the ethereal vapor to destroy the
pain of surgical  operations.   He also stated that he had been and was then toe
much engaged  to make further experiments with this new agent, and he  was 
12
tlien about to be absent from the city for some time, but that if I would call at
his laboratory some time during  the  following'winter he would  show me its
ciiVets.   On another occasion Dr. Jackson asked me if I would consent to be
his patient, and allow him to make trial of the ether upon myself.   I had pre-
viously inhaled various gases at his laboratory on Green-street, and  he  said
that  the ether vapor would produce very different effects from either of them.
   "I cannot now state from  recollection that Dr. Jackson, at either of the
interviews heretofore alluded to in this deposition, specified the particular kind
of ether he had in view for preventing the pain of  surgical operations; but I
have no doubt whatever it was sulphuric ether. I am certain it was not chloric
ether.
   " I have never had any conversation with Dr. Jackson respecting the 'ether
controversy,' except at a very brief casual interview in State-street, in the last
week of December, A. D. 1848.
   " Early in the spring of the year 1847, I called upon Dr.  Jackson to  ask
him if the ether with which Dr. Morton was operating was prepared  by him
(Dr. Jackson).   I was then intending, if such should prove to be the fact, to
have two teeth extracted by Dr. Morton, and to inhale the vapor.   Dr. Jack-
son then advised me  that Dr. Morton was  not a safe or judicious person to
administer  the  ether.  Dr. Jackson expressed entire confidence in its safety
and efficacy, but on account of the irritable state of my lungs, he thought I had
better not inhale it.
                                            "HENRY  D. FOWLE."

    " Suffolk,     )
February 4, 1849, \ SS'
   " Then personally  appeared  Henry D.  Fowle,  herein  before  named, and
made oath that the foregoing statements,  by him signed, sire true.
   " Before me,
                                      "CHARLES  E. ALLEN,
                                              " Justice of the P?ace."

   The following unpublished letter is from Mr. D. Jay Browne, of the city of
New York, well  known as a  scientific  and agricultural writer, and author of
an excellent work on American  Forest Trees:

                                         " New York, Dec.  19th, 1851.
   " Dr. Charles  T. Jackson, Boston,— Dear  Sir :  In reply to your note of
the 6th, requesting  me to communicate in writing what I know concerning
your discovery of a means of preventing the pains  incident to  surgical opera-
tions, anterior to  the year 1846,1 would state, that I have examined my diary
and find that, while I was engaged as engineer in locating the Northern Rail- '
road in New Hampshire, nn November, 1845, I called at  your laboratory in
Somerset-street,  Boston. .                                            J
   '■ You had recently returned from a mining survey on the  shores of Lake
Superior, and told me of some of the important discoveries you  had made there
of copper, silver  and iron  mines.  I had  a long  conversation with  you in
regard to the importance of yom publishing your valuable researches  which
I fear, you are too much in the habit of delaying.  I had particular reference
to your chemical researches m relation to agriculture.  You made your usual
excuses for your neglect, saying that you  wished to  review them before vou
gave them to the public, as you had several other discoveries to  publish at some 
13
future time, which  you intended to make free to the world.   You then com-
municated to me, as one of the most important discoveries you had ever made.
the means of paralyzing the nerves of sensation  by the administration of
ethereal vapor by inhalation  into the lungs, and spoke with great enthusiasm
and earnestness of the importance of this discovery in surgery, stating that the
means proposed by you was  both  efficient and  safe, and would prevent any
sensation of pain, even in the  most severe surgical operations.   The application
of this means of preventing pain in our domestic animals, which require difficult
surgical operations in veterinary art, struck me as of importance  to farmers and
others interested  in their breeding  and  management;  and that part of your
conversation which  related to the treatment of animals, is most strongly im-
pressed upon my memory, on account of the interest I had taken for so many
years in all subjects connected with agriculture,  or the operations of nature of
any kind.
   "I remember, very distinctly, how graphically you described  the manner in
which you made this discovery, which arose from an accident  that happened
to you while hastily  preparing some chlorine gas  for one of your lectures.
You spoke of this discovery as one made by you several years  before, and as
the most important you had  ever  made.   You confided it  to  me as one of
your former pupils, and I strictly held it sacred and never divulged the secret
before it was made public by yourself, the  next year, when, on the occasion of
a dispute about priority of discovery, I deemed it my duty to you to speak of
it freely to my friends,  and  by this means it came to your  knowledge  that
I had retained -in my memory the facts I now communicate to you in writing.
as I did to you orally, during your late  visit to this city.  You asked me
what  name you  gave  to  the  agent  employed by you at the  time you made
your communication to me in 1845; you then called it hydric ether, which I
understood to be sulphuric ether that has  been washed by water, for the pur-
pose of removing any alcohol or acids contained in  it.  I had long since sup-
posed that all dispute about priority of discovery of  anaesthesia by ether had
been settled in your favor, or I should  have  imparted to you this information
sooner.  Here, no serious doubts exist with regard to your rights as the origi-
nal discoverer, and I trust that the verdict of mankind will  be  unanimous in
your favor, as that  of  all scientific men is, who have had an opportunity of
examining the evidence  of the case.
                                    " Respectfully, I am,
                                         "Your friend, &c,
                                              "D.  JAY BROWNE.

   " Signed in my presence, this 19th day of December, 1851.
                              " ADONIRAM  CHANDLER,
                                     "Cor. Sec. of the Am.  Institute.^

   Dr. Jackson communicated his  discovery to Mr. Joseph Peabody, in Feb-
ruary, 1846.  Mr. Peabody, after having graduated  at Harvard University,
was at that time a student in chemistry in Dr.  Jackson's laboratory.  He is
at present a student at the School of Mines of France.   He  narrates the cir-
cumstances under which the  communication was made to him, as follows:

   "I was suffering from  a  severe  toothache;  and,  intending to have two
teeth extracted, a fellow-student urged me to try the power of mesmerism to
effect insensibility to pain, offering to attempt to produce the magnetic state. 
14
I consented, and he commenced the experiment.  While we were thus engaged
Dr.  Jackson came into the office, and remarked that it was a loss ot  time and
labor to attempt to repeat the experiments of the mesmenzers;  for their insen-
sibility  was  only a pretence.    ' If you want to have your teeth extracted
without pain,' said  he, < I have  mesmerism bottled up in the other room —in
the shape of sulphuric ether.'   He then repeated to me  minutely the effects
which would be produced by the inhalation  of sulphuric  ether.   I asked him
where he  got his information from.  He said that he had tried it on himself;
that,  about four years before,  he inhaled it freely, with the view of ascertain-
ing the effects of its vapor on the  system, and was  astonished to find  it pro-
duced an  entire loss of consciousness ; that  this state speedily passed away,
without leaving any unpleasant effects.  He  said  that  subsequently,  while
engaged in preparing some chemical experiments, he  accidentally got his lungs t
full of chlorine,  which produced a sudden irritation and severe distress ;  that,
hoping to  obtain relief,  he applied sulphuric ether;  that he  breathed the
vapor copiously — having poured the ether upon a cloth  which was  laid over
his mouth.   He soon became unconscious and perfectly free from pain, although
the trouble  in  his  lungs  returned when  the  effects of the ether had wholly
passed off.   He urged me to apply  the ether when I wished to  have my teeth
extracted, assuring  me of his  confidence that I would escape the pain of the
operation.   He  added that ether  prepared  expressly for  the purpose,  and
freed from its alcohol, would  ensure success.   I immediately  determined to
make the trial; and as I was  obliged to return to Salem, I there commenced
Jo re-distil some ether with sulphuric acid.
   " In the  mean time I consulted  several  chemical and medical works  (in a
large scientific library to which  I had access), in relation  to the effects of sul-
phuric ether;  and found that all the authorities stated that the action of ether
upon  the system was injurious, and warned against its use.   My father was
also  averse  to  my  breathing  it.   I therefore concluded  that  the operation
proposed would not  be sufficiently serious to warrant me  in  using any appli-
cation pronounced dangerous  by high authorities.  Upon  my return to  Dr.
Jackson's laboratory, I stated to him the opinion  of chemical and  medical
writers in relation to the use of ether. He said that he was aware of the opinions
in the works upon the subject; but, notwithstanding their views, he was satis-
fied that he  was right — that the application of ether would be perfectly harm-
less,  and its effects would be what he had stated.
   " This was not the only occasion on which the subject of the effects of ether
was  introduced.   He alluded  to it in several subsequent conversations, and
always with the same confidence, so that, when I learned the  final success of
the application, I was not at all surprised."

   The evidence above presented  furnishes the strongest proof that Dr. Jack-
son's statements, in regard to his  experiments and inductions relative to sul-
phuric ether, are true.   It is  admitted by the majority report, that "these
statements, if true, prove that this  discovery,  so far  as private  experiment and
philosophical deduction  could go,  was  as full and  complete  in 1842  as it
was  on the  morning of  October 1,  1846, after Dr.  Morton's successful  oper-
ation on Eben Frost."  The undersigned considers it established by this evi-
dence that the discovery, to the full extent to which it has been defined in the
first four propositions presented on pages 4 and 5, was complete in the mind of
Dr.  Jackson previous to March, 1846, before Mr. Morton claims to have made
any experiments with sulphuric ether. 
15
   The  witnesses  above named have  never been  impeached  or  contradicted.
 The only answer which the opponents of Dr. Jackson have given to this evi-
 dence, is, that Dr. Jackson's conduct was  inconsistent with his possession of
 this great discovery.   It is urged that,  if his statements were true, he would
 have hastened to verify his discovery; that he would have at  once announced
 it to the  world.   The  majority report demands, " if this  statement  be true,
 how it  happens that no contemporary written paper,  no private memorandum
 is exhibited."  These objections can be easily answered.
   Dr.  Jackson's  conduct  in this  matter  was  perfectly consistent  with his
 course in relation  to his other discoveries.
   Mr.  Hayes, Dr. Jackson's counsel, in his argument before the committee.
 remarked :   " Dr. Jackson's friends have often remonstrated with him against
 his procrastination in publishing his discoveries.   The publication of some of
 his most important discoveries, as, for instance, that of the presence of chlorine
 in meteoric iron, was delayed for four years.*  One of his most  important scien-
 tific labors has been his researches on gastric juice.   The results of his obser-
 vations were communicated to individual physicians."   Dr. Jeffries, of Boston,
 in  an  address delivered before  the  Suffolk  District  Medical Society, thus
 speaks  of them:   "Let  us remember  with grateful pleasure  that one of
 our own  number,  Charles T.  Jackson,  M.  D.,  upon whom has been con-
 ferred  the  highest honor that  can  be  conferred  from  abroad, did, in a
 series  of  experiments  on   gastric juice, so long  ago as  in  the  year  1834.
 go far  to show the chemical  affinities of  vital  action."   These researches
 have not been published by Dr. Jackson, to this day.  The objection that Dr:
 Jackson could not have made the induction at the time he claims, because he
 was not more prompt in announcing it to the world,  has no weight against the
 positive testimony that he  did make this induction a long time*before he com-
 municated it  to Mr. Morton.   In  the  language of  Mr. J. H. Abbot,  " The
 objection, if admitted to be valid, would be subversive, in not a  few cases, of the
 most clearly established rights of  discovery.  Harvey did not announce to the
 world  his great discovery  till twelve years after  it  had been  made.   It was
 more than a  quarter of a century after Jenner  had conceived  the idea of
 vaccination, and sixteen after his friend John Hunter was accustomed to allude
 to his  views,  in his  lecture room in London, before  he made the direct appli-
 cation of vaccine  matter in the  manner which is now common.  It is well
 known  that Newton forbore to publish most of his great discoveries, for  many
 years after they were made.
   " The same cautiousness in regard to the publication of his discoveries, char-
 acterized Wollaston, in a remarkable  degree, as it has  many  other minds of
 the highest order.   Much  of  this same cautiousness  is known  to belong to Dr.
 Jackson, and  hence  the confidence with which his discoveries   are  received in
 Europe at their first announcement."
   The question is not whether other men  would have conducted as Dr. Jack-
 son did, in delaying his experiments and public announcement of his discovery,
 but, whether Dr. Jackson's  course  was  consistent  with  his  own character
 and habits.   Dr. Jackson's most intimate scientific friends have always spoken
 of his conduct in this matter as precisely what  they should have expected of
 him.   Dr. Bell, one  of Dr. Jackson's intimate friends, says: "One  of the
great stumbling blocks  in the minds of those who know nothing of the pecu-
  * Dr.  Jackson, as it appears from Silliman's Journal of Science,  discovered chlorine in
meteoric iron in 18;>4, and published  no account of his discovery till the  year 1838.  Other
similar facts might be added. 
16
liar mental constitution of certain  men  of ingenuity and science, — the cir-
cumstance  that Dr. Jackson, if conscious of such a mighty discovery, did not
make a great bruit about it—was  perfectly explained in the minds of all of us
who intimately knew him  and his modes of thinking and  action ;  we feel that
what he did. was precisely what a priori we should  have expected him to do.
Indeed. I have often spoken of his  course, in  the early days of this discovery,
as exactlv analogous to his course of action in relation to  certain valuable dis-
coveries of his. in the geological surveys of Maine and New  Hampshire."
   Mr. D. Jay Browne was  remonstrating with Dr. Jackson against his habit
of delay in publishing his researches, when Dr. Jackson,  after excusing  him-
self for his neglect by saying that  he wished to review his researches before
giving them to -the public, referred  to this very discovery of anaesthesia, which
he intended, at some future time, to make  free to the world.
   Dr. Jackson, in  fact, had other and sufficient excuses for not extending his
experiments of verification.   He had already verified his  discovery upon  him-
self;^- experiments were needed only to satisfy the world.  He had no facil-
ities for making these  experiments.    He had  wholly retired from  the  practice
of medicine and surgery.   He,  therefore, had access to no subjects for experi-
ment.  He naturally  shrunk  from  going to the hospitals, Avhere the chemists
are regarded with distrust and jealousy by the surgeons, and where, as eventg
have shown,  the  largest honor of successful experiment  would  have  been  •<
claimed by the verifiers.   Moreover, during  the whole period, from 1.841  to
1846, Dr. Jackson was overwhelmed with other pressing duties.   From 1840
to 1844, he was engaged in the geological survey of  New Hampshire.  Dur-
ing eight months of each year he was in the field.   The four months  spent in
his laboratory, were devoted to  chemical researches connected with the survey.
The  extent of "his  labors will be seen by referring to the  large quarto volume
containing his report on the  geology of New  Hampshire,  a volume containing
the most valuable  original  contributions to agricultural chemistry that  have
ever appeared in this country.  Before this report was printed, he was called   \
to  make geological explorations on  Lake  Superior.   During the years 1844
and 1845, and part of 1846, he was actively engaged  in the explorations in
that  district,  and  the metallurgical  researches  connected therewith, which
brought to light the valuable copper mines of Kewenaw Point.*
   But there was another and higher reason why Dr.  Jackson did not  abandon
all other duties to devote himself to experiments of verification.   During this
whole  period,  he was constantly discovering and  developing new truths  in
science.  It is the  law of Providence that those rare  minds which are capable
of discovering truth, do not measure the value of their discoveries by practical
standards.  Their  province is discovery, not application.    As the  search  for  .
each new  truth effaces from  the  mind the  thoughts of  the  last  discovery,
they are kept to  their higher  work by that  benign  arrangement which  thus
provides for the extension of knowledge among  men.   Such men  strike the
sparks and kindle the fires  which  common  men can  feed and  tend.   The
objections  now answered  could only come from those who cannot  appreciate
the man of genius, and who cannot  imagine  that  a  philosopher  should  have
strong confidence in deductions from his own reasonings  and limited experi-
   * "The peninsula of Kewenaw Point has been known for some years to contain important
mines of native copper, which have been explored with care by many  American geologists,  and
particularly by Dr. Charles T. Jackson well known by his labors upon the geology of many
parts of North America and more celebrated still on account  of his important discovery of
etherization." — L. Ehe De Beaumont,  Systhnes  des Montagues, Tome  ii.  page 702
Paris.  1852.                                                      '  r e> 
17
 merits, as in truths which had received the most extended demonstration and
 verification.
   At the commencement of this  controversy,  and for  several months after it
 began, Mr. Morton, his professional advisers  and advocates,  rested his claim
 to this discovery solely upon the ground of his performance of an experiment
 of verification, although it was devised and committed to him by Dr. Jackson.
 Dr. Jacob Bigelow admits that Dr. Jackson "made partial  experiments  and
 recommended,  but did not  make, decisive  ones."   Mr. N.  I. Bowditch,  the
 most zealous and  prominent advocate of Mr. Morton, in his  Report to  the
 Massachusetts General Hospital, argues in substance that the  act of first ad-
 ministering ether to a patient, though under  Dr. Jackson's  instructions, and
 on  Dr. Jackson's expressly assumed responsibility, constituted Mr. Morton the
 discoverer of etherization.   He says, " He  [Mr. Morton?]  administered  sul-
 phuric ether to a patient.    By so doing  he made the discovery."   Dr. H. J.
 Bigelow says : — " He who verifies the suggestion is the true discoverer."
   If anything can be  established by human testimony, it is proved that  Dr.
 Jackson, on  and  before the 30th day of September, 1846, had  clearly and
 fully formed the induction that the nerves of  sensation could be paralyzed by
 the inhalation of pure sulphuric ether, to such  an extent, that the severest  sur-
 gical operations could  be  performed without causing pain, and that he  had
 devised the means of applying it with perfect safety to the patient.
   By all the principles recognized among  scientific  men, the discovery was
 made when the induction was complete in the mind of Dr. Jackson, and noth-
 ing remained to be done but to subject it to the test of actual experiment.    No
 experiments of verification performed by another, can take the right  to a
 discovery from  him who first formed the induction, and prescribed the
 means of verifying it.
   The doctrine, which has been so earnestly asserted in behalf of Mr. Morton,
 that  verification  experiments constitute  the discovery,  has  been repeatedly
 Urged in other cases,  and as often  repudiated by  the scientific world.  A few
 cases may be referred to which are directly in  point.  Franklin observed  that
 the form of the electric  spark discharged from  the prime conductor of an elec-
 tric  machine, was like  chain lightning.  He observed that  bodies struck by
 lightning were  affected  very much like those through which an electric spark
 was passed, and he made a  series  of experiments with the electric  machine,
 in order still further  to expose the relations of lightning and  electricity.    He
 suspended flocks of cotton from the prime conductor, and observed that when
 the conductor was charged, the cotton stretched downwards towards the table.
 He placed a  needle-point below, when the electricity was  drawn off  from  the
 cotton,  and it was drawn back to the conductor.   Soon the conductor itself was
 discharged silently of its electricity, so that it would give no  spark so  long
 as  the needle was beneath it.   He  moreover observed  a star  of light
 upon the  needle-point  so  long as it was beneath the  electrified conductor.
 Now. from  these  premises,  and  comparatively few and trivial experiments,
 Franklin boldly declared his conviction that lightning and electricity  are iden-
 tical ; and, still more, he said, that, if a pointed rod, connected with the earth,
 were erected  towards  a  thunder cloud, it would silently draw off its electricity,
and  prevent  a  shock.   Notwithstanding the loss of life  and property to be
averted by his discovery, he  did not hasten to erect the conductors which were
harmlessly to snatch the thunderbolts from the heavens.   He  even suffered his
o-rand discovery to be first  verified  by others.  A month before he performed
the  celebrated experiment with the kite, a  French philosopher, Dalibard,  act- 
is
 in<' upon the suggestions of Franklin, and adopting the means which he  had
 indicated, erected a rod at Marly-la-Yille, near Paris,  and employed Coiffier,
 an ex-dragoon, to watch it during a thunder-storm, and the ex-dragoon, in fact,
 took the first  electric spark  from the rod.   By the  unanimous verdict of
 mankind, the glory of this discovery has been awarded to Franklin, as it was by
 him that the method of obtaining it was originally devised.   If the verification
 doctrines, uro-ed by the opponents of Dr. Jackson, are sound, upon the tomb of
 Coiffier,  the ex-dragoon, and  not upon that of Franklin, should be  inscribed
 the commemorative motto, " Eripuit ft I num.  ra'/o."
   The case of Franklin presents other remarkable analogies to the present.   In
 the latter the attempt has been made to show that there  has been no discovery;
 that anaesthesia was known to the Creeks and the Chinese; that even the prop-
 erties of ether were  long  ago well  known, and  that  Dr. Jackson was only
 posted up in the current knowledge of the day upon this subject.   So, in  the
 case of Franklin, the antiquarians attempted to take  from him the glory of his
 discovery by asserting that the very experiment devised by Franklin, had been
 performed a hundred years before.  They showed that a sentinel who  mounted
 guard on one of the bastions of the castle of Duino, on the Adriatic Sea,  when
 he observed indications of a coming storm,  was  in the  habit of taking a halberd,
 always ready for the  purpose, which  he applied to an iron rod standing in a
 vertical position ; on observing sparks at  its point, he rang a bell to warn  the
 peasants in the field and the fishermen at sea to betake themselves to a place
 of shelter.
   It is well known that  for  a  short time it was  contended that  the  dis-
 covery of  the new planet  Neptune was  made by Galle, who first  saw it.
 Gralle,  indeed, verified the  discovery by using the telescope as  indicated by
 Leverrier, who, by calculations founded upon the perturbations of Uranus, was
 enabled to direct the observer to the point  in the heavens where he should find
 it.   The final judgment of the scientific world  coincides with that  of Sir David
 Brewster,  as  given  in his  address before the British Association  for the
 Advancement of Science, in  1850.  " The planet Neptune was discovered by
 Adams and Leverrier before a ray of its light had entered the human eye."
   The same laws recognized by the scientific world, have restored to Watt the
 honor of being the discoverer of the composition of water,  though there  is no
 evidence or allegation  that he made any experiments upon the subject.
 .  He drew  his inference or deduction from facts furnished by Priestley.   His
 conclusions were verified by the more accurate experiments of Cavendish.  The
 discovery is awarded  to Watt  upon the ground, that, from  reasoning on the
 facts furnished by Priestley,  he first drew the inference that water is composed
 of oxygen and hydrogen combined, and condensed, with  a loss of  a portion of
 their latent heat.   (Vide Arago and Dumas, Eloge of Watt.)
   If the  cases  above cited have prevailed,  a fortiori must the vastly stronger
 case  of Dr. Jackson.   According to  the  award  of  the French  Academy°in
 1850, Dr. Jackson first verified  upon himself the physiological fact that
 persons who inhale  ethereal vapor are for a time  deprived of  all sensibility
 Moreover the experiments for  complete verification, or rather that demonstra-
 tion which should satisfy the world, were made under Dr. Jackson's advice and
direction, and the very means were pointed out  by him.   All the results were
attained which he had given full assurance would follow from those  experi-
 ments.   To such an extent, as it appears from the testimony of Messrs  Barnes
 and Mclntyre, was the responsibility, assumed by him, that Morton was in fact
 simply his mechanical agent.   The case comes  emphatically within the princi 
19
pies  declared by Rev. William Whewell,  Historian of the Inductive Sciences,
who says: —" I do not concede that experiments of verification, made after a
discovery has been clearly brought to view by one person, and devised by the
discoverer and committed by  him for performance to another, give the oper-
ator a right to claim the discovery as his own."  (Letter to Dr. C. T. Jack-
son.)
  Upon these precedents and  principles. Morton's operations can give him  no
claim to the discovery, for no  great original discovery can be made  in the in-
ductive sciences, to quote Mr. J. H. Abbot's admirable paper,  " without a single
original experiment, without a single independent, original observation, with-
out a single philosophical induction,— the essential, the only common element in
all discoveries in the inductive sciences,— without, in fine, originating a single
new idea.   The most Mr. Morton can claim, is not in any degree  discovery,
but performance, verification,  endeavors to introduce into practical use the dis-
covery of another man."   (Littell's Living Age, No.  214, p. 569.)
  The scientific precedents  furnish  us cases which overthrow another  preten-
sion of Mr. Morton.  He alleges that he had been seeking for some means of
preventing pain in dental surgery anterior to Dr. Jackson's  communication to
him on the 30th September, 1846.   No one, not even himself, alleges  that he
had discovered any such means anterior to that time.   Seeking for a discovery
is not making it.    The following case is  in  point.  Halley, Hook, and Wren
had  been seeking  to establish, and were  upon the very verge of making, the
discovery of the law of gravitation, to wit, that the force of gravity follows the
inverse duplicate proportion of the distances, when the discovery  was made by
Newton.   Halley,  meeting  with difficulties which neither he, nor Hooke, nor
those to whom he applied for assistance, were able to solve, went to Cambridge
to consult  Newton, "who," in the words  of Whewell,  "supplied him with
what he  had so ardently sought for."   (Whewell's  History of  the Inductive
Sciences, vol. 2, pp. 150-1;  London edition, 1837.)
   The whole civilized world awards this discovery to  Newton.  Granting  all
that Morton has alleged in relation to  previous experiments  with  ether, upon
his own showing he was unsuccessful until  Dr. Jackson " supplied him with
what he so ardently sought for."   Upon the principles of this case, his alleged
seeking,  and  almost  finding,  gives  him  no claim  to  Dr. Jackson's  dis-
covery.
   We fome now to the period when this discovery was  subjected  to those prac-
tical tests and received that verification which demonstrated  to the world that
the most severe physical suffering can be prevented by human agency.   What-
ever may have been Dr. Jackson's  delay in bringing forth  his discovery, the
undersigned  considers  the  proof conclusive that the final demonstration and
publication of this  discovery,  were effected mainly through the agency of Dr.
Jackson.   We will now consider the evidence presented in support of  the 5th
proposition, before  announced;  namely, that Dr.  Jackson caused experiments
to be  made, under his directions and on his responsibility, which verified his
conclusion a's to the power of sulphuric ether to prevent the  pain of the sever-
est surgical operations.             _„,  .         ,,T  iTrm,r.T»T
   On the 30th day of September, 1846, he instructed Mr. W. T. G. Morton,
a dentist of Boston, how to  apply the ether, and induced  him to test, under
his direction, and  with an express assumption of all  the responsibility of  the
experiment, its power to destroy pain in dental operations.    On the same day
Mr  Morton, following the directions he had received,  extracted a tooth from  a
patient without causing him  any pain, and thus verified Dr. Jackson's indue- 
1:0
tion so far as the extraction of teeth is concerned.   The next day, Dr. Jackson
induced Mr. Morton to go to the surgeons of the  Massachusetts General Hos-
pital and request  permission to  make trial of it to prevent the  pain of severe
surgical operations.   The results of these trials of sulphuric ether completely
verified Dr.  Jackson's  conclusion as to the power of that substance to prevent
the pain of the severest surgical operations.
  Fortunately Dr. Jacksons communications to Mr.  Morton were made before
two highly intelligent  and unimpeachable witnesses, gentlemen of  education
und character, Messrs.  George 0. Barnes  and James Mclntyre.  Their testi-
mony,  reduced  to writing within a few weeks  after  the transaction, is here
subjoined :

   " I,  George 0. Barnes, of Plymouth, in  the Commonwealth of Massachu-
setts, depose and  say, that in the fall of 1846 I  was a student in chemistry
with Dr. Charles  T. Jackson ; that in the month  of September I was at work
in the  back  room of Dr. Jackson's laboratory,  when  Mr. W. T. G.  Morton
passed  through the room, as I supposed  to go into the house, which  adjoins
the laboratory.   He soon returned, having in his hand an India-rubber bag
belonging  to Dr.  Jackson.   As he went into the  apparatus or  glass-room, I
heard Dr. Jackson ask  Morton what he wanted to  do with the bag.  He replied
that he had  a refractory patient, who would not allow  him to take out her tooth,
and that he  wished to act on her imagination, so as to induce her to submit  to
the operation ;  that he meant to  fill the  bag with  air, meaning, as I under-
stood, atmospheric air,  which would give it a  formidable appearance.   He then
asked how he should go to work to distend the bag.   ' The lungs or a pair of
bellows,' said Dr.  Jackson,  ' can  do  that.'   ' But,'  continued Dr. Jackson,
' your  proposition, Morton,  is very absurd;   the  patient will not be  deceived
in that way  ; you will  produce  no result, and will be denounced as an  impos-
tor.'   ' I don't know that,' replied Morton ;  ' I think, with this bag under my
arm, well blown up, that I could  make her believe  anything.'   While  saying
this, he placed the bag under  his arm, and,  pressing the bag with his elbow
several times, illustrated the manner in which he  would operate.  ' If I could
once get her mouth open,' said  Morton, ' I would  have her tooth out.   Why,'   |
said he, ' a  man once bled to death by the mere force of imagination.'   As he
was proceeding to give an account of this experiment, Dr. Jackson interrupted
him, and  said, ' Pooh  ! you don't credit such a story as that,  surely !   I
advise you  to have nothing to do with this  idea of using  atmospheric air to
deceive your patients;  it will  only injure you.'   Morton  replied,  ' I don't
care.   I'll  blow it up.'  Morton then left Dr. Jackson, and was going from
the glass-room, where the latter part of the  conversation had been principally
held, into the front room towards the street door,  with  the bag  swinging in his
hand,  when Dr. Jackson followed him,  took the bag from his hand and threw
it on the floor.   There  had been  also  some conversation  concerning nitrous
oxide,  but  not one word concerning sulphuric ether;  and Morton had  not
asked  Dr. Jackson to suggest to him anything to prevent pain during his oper-
ations  of extracting teeth.   Dr. Jackson then addressed him, and said, ' Now,
Morton, I can tell  you something that  will  produce a real effect.   Go to Mr.
 Burnett's, the  apothecary, and get some very strong  sulphuric ether,— the
 stronger the better,— spatter it on your handkerchief, put it to your patient's
 mouth, take care that  it be well inhaled, and in a minute or two perfect insen-
 sibility will be produced.'   ' Sulphuric ether !'  said Morton,  ' what is that?
 Is it a gas ?  Have you got any of it?  Show it to  me.'   Dr. Jackson went 
21
 to the laboratory case, and  took  down  the bottle  of  sulphuric ether, which
 Morton examined, and smelt of as though he had never seen the article before,
 saying, it was ' queer-smelling stuff'   ' Are you sure,'  said Morton, ' that this
 will do it ?'   ' Yes,'  replied Dr. Jackson, ' I am sure.'   The rest of the Doc-
 tor's reply I did not  hear, as I passed into the other room for some purpose,
 being  engaged at the time in analytical work.  Afterwards I heard  Morton
 several times repeat,  ' Are you sure it will do it ? '   He even asked Mr.  Mc-
 Intyre, another student in the laboratory, and myself,  if we thought it would
 doit.  ' Won't it  hurt the patient? '  said he.  'No,' replied Dr. Jackson, ' it
 will not do any harm  ; for I have tried it on myself.'   He then briefly described
 his own experiments and the effects, and said, ' that the patients, after  breath-
 ing a dozen breaths, would fall back in the chair insensible ;  and you can do
 with them as you  please, without their knowing anything about it, or  feeling
 any pain ;  so that you can take out their teeth at your  leisure.'  Dr. Jackson
 distinctly said, ' It will not do the least  injury, I assure  you.'   Indeed, Dr.
 Jackson urged the matter very earnestly and with  perfect confidence, taking
 on himself the whole responsibility.   He urged  Morton to try it on  himself,
 saying that it was the only way to convince himself.  '  Shut yourself up,' said
 he, ' in your room, and breathe it as I have directed.'   At the same time, Dr.
 Jackson, taking a handkerchief and  bottle in his  hands, went through the
 movement of applying  the ether to it, and, placing the handkerchief to  his
 mouth, made several deep inhalations,  saying, ' This is  the way you must take
 it.'  Morton then  left, promising to try it  immediately.   After Morton  left,
 the students in the laboratory conversed considerably  about the proposed ex-
 periment ; and some one asking  the question whether Morton would succeed,
 Dr. Jackson said confidently, ' He will, if he follows my directions.'
   " Either on the afternoon of the same day, or the next day, I am not  positive
 which, Morton came  to announce the success of  his trial.   He stated that he
 tried it on a patient with complete success ; for, while he extracted a tooth, the
 person was insensible, and knew nothing about it.   Dr. Jackson expressed no
 surprise, but appeared as if he had expected this  result.   Mr. Morton intended
 soon to perform  another extraction.  Dr. Jackson  then  said  to  him, ' You
 must go to Dr. Warren; and obtain his permission to administer it at the Mas-
 sachusetts General Hospital, and if possible it should be in a capital operation ;
 for the people will not  believe in  the insensibility to  pain in case of a mere
 tooth, since it is very common for patients, in an ordinary case, to say that it
 did not hurt them, when the twitch is  very sudden,  and the operation skilfully
 performed; this proof would not'be regarded by the  public as satisfactory.'
 Morton strongly objected at  first  to  going to the hospital;  that  everybody
 could smell the ether, and it would not be  kept  secret,  which it was Morton's
 object to do.  He  asked if something could not be put into it which would con-
 ceal the ether odor.   Dr.  Jackson replied, ' Yes ; some French essence, as the
 oil of Neroli, may  answer in a measure, and a pleasant  perfume will be left on
 the patient;' remarking, laughingly,  'the scent of  the  roses will hang round
 him still.'  After  some argument, and Dr. Jackson's further insisting upon it,
 Morton promised to go to the hospital.
   " In the course of this conversation, Morton repeatedly begged the doctor to
 keep  the matter  a secret.   ' No !'  answered Dr.  Jackson, ' I will  have no
 secrets with my professional  brethren.  I  intend to give Dr. Keep the  same
 information which I have given to you;' and, in point  of fact, every one  who
afterwards came  to  get  information  on the subject,  was  at  once  told  all
about it. 
;i.)
  " Some time after this, when the experiments had  proved  successful at  the
hospital and elsewhere, and while the  patent was  being negotiated, the right
of using the ether having been assigned to Morton, Dr.  Jackson urged him, in
my presence,  to  present the free use of it to the hospital, saying that they
would not buy a patented article, and it ought to be given to the poor.   Mor-
ton was very reluctant to do  this, and asked if there were  not some pay
patients at the hospital who could afford to remunerate him for administering
the ether.  This was  argued  a long time, and  Morton finally said that he
would do so.
   " A few days after, Morton called  at the  office when Dr. Jackson was  not
in, with a glass bulb in his hand, having only two openings.   He proposed to
fasten an India-rubber bag upon one of the openings, to contain the sulphuric
ether, a sponge to be  placed in the bulb, and the  patient to inhale the ether
from the other opening;  there being  no aperture for the admission of  atmos-
pheric air.  His intention was, he told us,  that the patient should breathe  the
ether  vapor pure, without admixture of atmospheric air.   I told him  of  the
indispensability of atmospheric air, knowing very well that it would be danger-
ous to breathe ether vapor without the common air being mixed with it.   He
was told, also, that the ether would dissolve the India rubber.   He then said
that he would stop the opening with a cork, instead of the bag;  intending still
to exclude the common air.
   " Some time after,  I heard Dr. Jackson speak of Morton's being  reckless.
He had heard that Morton did not manage well  in  the administration  of  the
ether.   Dr. Jacksou expressed his opinion  that it ought to be in the  hands of
careful and skilful persons.   In fact, he was  sorry that he had  communicated
his discovery to Morton,  and  that he had employed him to make  those early
experiments with the ether.   He spoke strongly on  these points.

   « Boston, May 21,  1847."               " GE0RGE  °-  BARNES'
   " Sworn before me,
                     "JOSIAH QUINCY,
                                " Justice  of the Peace."

   " I, James Mclntyre,  of Bangor, in the State of Maine, depose  and say,
that in the month of September, 1846, I was a student in  chemistry with  Dr.
Charles T. Jackson, of Boston.  In the latter part of September, I was sitting
in the front room or office of Dr. Jackson's  laboratory, when Mr. W. T. G.
Morton came in and asked for Dr. Jackson, and passed through the office into
the house adjoining the laboratory.   In a short  time Morton came into  the
back room with an India-rubber bag in his hands, and passed through into the
glass-room.   Dr. Jackson came  in  with  him,  or shortly afterwards.    Dr.
Jackson asked Morton what he wanted with the bag.   He said he wished to
blow up the bag, and act upon a patient's imagination by making her breathe
from the bag.   The precise words of Morton's answer I do not remember ■  but
the purport of it was, that he wanted to extract some teeth from  a lady 'who
objected on account of the pain, and that he expected, by making her breathe
from the bag, to believe that she would suffer no  pain  from the extraction of
her teeth.  In order to show  the effect  of imagination, he  gave an account of
an experiment upon two criminals, one of whom was bled to  death •' and  the
other, having his arm pricked and warm water poured  upon it  died'from  the
effect of the  imagination.  Dr. Jackson said that it was absurd, and never
occurred.   He told Morton that it would be useless to try that as  he could
> 
23
 not act upon her  imagination;  and, if he failed, she would set him down as a
 humbug.   There was then  some conversation  about  the use  of exhilarating
 gas;  "whether it was  first mentioned by  Dr. Jackson or Morton,  I do  not
 remember.  Morton asked if he could not make it.   Dr. Jackson told him that
 he could not succeed without apparatus and the assistance of some one who had
 some  chemical knowledge; and that,  if he undertook to make it, he would  get
 nitric oxid instead of nitrous oxide.  He asked Dr. Jackson if he  could  not
 prepare some for  him; this Dr. Jackson declined  to do, on account of his
 business.   Morton was then going away with the bag, and I  have no  doubt
 intended to use the bag by distending it with atmospheric air.
   "As he was going, Dr. Jackson told him that he could tell him something
 that would make the patient insensible, and then he could do what he had a
 mind  to with them.   Morton asked what it was.  Dr. Jackson then told him
 to go  to Burnett's, and get some pure sulphuric ether, and pour it on a hand-
 kerchief, and put it to the  patient's mouth and let  her inhale  it.   Morton
 asked what sulphuric  ether  was, what kind of looking stuff it was.   I stayed
 in the front room while Morton  and Dr. Jackson  went to look at the ether.
 From Morton's question about the ether, I am satisfied that he knew nothing
 about its properties  or nature.  I heard Morton ask Dr.  Jackson very partic-
 ularly whether  it would  be safe to use it.   Dr. Jackson assured him that it
 was perfectly safe,  and alluded to  the  students at  Cambridge having used it.
 Morton appeared to be afraid to use the ether,  and asked  him several times if
 it was safe.   Dr. Jackson advised Morton  to  try it himself.   Morton  asked
 me if I would  be willing to take it.   I  told him  that I would.  The  whole
 conversation between Dr. Jackson and Morton I did not hear, as I was not all
 the time in the  room with them.   But I felt sure, from the conversation  I had
 heard, that he came to the laboratory without any idea of using ether, or any-
 thing  else  which would destroy sensibility to pain; that he knew nothing  about
 its properties; that the effect which ether would produce was communicated to
 him by Dr. Jackson ;  and that he was  induced to try it only by the repeated
 assurances of Dr. Jackson  that  it would  produce  insensibility, and could be
 administered with safety.   The next  day after the above conversation, Morton
 came  into  the office, and told Dr. Jackson that the  ether had  worked nicely;
 that the patient suffered no pain.
   " During the time that I was in Dr. Jackson's laboratory. I never heard him
 express any doubt about the  effect which ether  would produce in causing insen-
 sibility to  pain, but have  heard him say that  it ought to  be administered with
 care and by persons acquainted with  the nature of it.
                                             "JAMES McINTYRE."
             " United States of  America,                )
 Xtate of Massachusetts, County of Suffolk,  City of Boston, )
   " On the first day of April, A. D., 1847, before me, came James Mclntyre,
 and, being duly sworn, did depose and  say  as within written,  and did sign the
 said within writing, as his  deposition  in and  concerning the matter herein
 specified.
  " In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and seal  of office, on this
 1st of April,  A. D. 1847.
                                      "JOHN  P. BIGELOW,
                                                    " Notary Public."

  In considering the comparative merit of the  parties concerned  in the  appli-
cation of this discovery, it is important to determine where the responsibility of 
24
the first experiment  rested.   If the experiment had  been fatal, would the
chemist and  physician, or the dentist,  have been  held accountable for the
calamity ?   He who incurred the  largest risk is entitled to the largest honors
and rewards of success.
   The undersigned cannot better express his views  upon this  point than by
quoting the language of a high medical  authority, the  late accomplished Dr.
Gay : —" Mr. Morton, by acting under the  authority of an educated  physician
and man of high scientific reputation, was shielded from all responsibility but
that assumed by him as Dr. Jackson's agent.   There was no demand for that
moral courage which some have ascribed to  him.   Let  the object of Mr. Mor-
ton's visit to Dr. Jackson be remembered, when the  peculiar properties of sul-
phuric ether were first  made  known to  him.   His purpose was  to  deceive  a
patient in a dental operation, by acting on the imagination.  Dr. Jackson dis-
suaded  him from it,  and brought  forward  a  long-cherished idea of his  own,
which he had  previously communicated  to several persons,— his plan for the    *
prevention of pain in surgical operations.   He supposed that he might safely
entrust to Mr. Morton the few and simple directions  necessary for carrying
the plan into effect, without his personal superintendence.   In  obeying these
directions,  Mr. Morton  assumed only the responsibility of the nurse who ad-
ministers a new  and bold  prescription of a physician.
   " The responsibility of the operation rested with Dr.  Jackson,  as much as if
he had personally administered the ether.   The maxim, 'Quifacit per ahum
facit per  se,' is strictly applicable in this  case.   Dr. Jackson has not, by his
mere absence during the execution of his  directions, forfeited any portion of
the credit that would otherwise have been his due."
   If  the person to whom Morton  first administered the ether had been  killed
by it, there cannot be a doubt that the fatal result would have been attributed
to Dr. Jackson's prescription or directions.   In case of a judicial investigation
Barnes and Mclntyre would have been  called to  prove that Morton adminis-
tered the ether in pursuance of the instructions,  and under the  directions of
Dr. Jackson,  and upon his medical and  scientific responsibility.   In that case
there can be but little doubt that Morton would have pleaded his entire  igno-
rance both of medicine and chemistry, and would have  justified himself by de-
claring that he merely followed the directions of a physician and chemist, upon
whom alone the moral and legal responsibility should rest.
   More than two months after the 30th of  September, 1846, when Dr. Jack-
son communicated his discovery to Morton,  the latter, his partners and agents,
finding that the claims to the discovery on  the ground  of verification could not
be sustained, for the first time set up a new  claim, namely, that Morton had
been for several months  making experiments with  ether.   Granting all that
Morton pretends upon this point, it amounts simply to this, that he was  seek-   |
ing for  the  discovery.   Nobody  alleges that  he  had found  out anything
before  Dr. Jackson's  communication   to  him.   The  undersigned, however,
believes all  Mr.  Morton's allegations,  respecting  his  previous experiments
with ether, are wholly unfounded.   Whoever impartially considers the evidence
in this case, must form the opinion entertained in France upon this point.
   The first thing to be considered in  the inquiry as to the truth of Morton's
allegations, is the high  improbability that  a  man of extreme ignorance upon
 :hemical  or medical  subjects, should have taken the very first  steps  towards
making this  discovery.   The undersigned  has no doubt of his total ignorance
 n  relation  to  sulphuric ether,  as shown  in his  inquiries  of Barnes and    '
 Mclntyre; as he  was unable to answer questions relative to the  composition  of 
25
sulphuric ether,  addressed to him personally, by  the  undersigned, since  this
subject has  been before this committee.   Dr. Gay thus speaks of his want of
medical knowledge: "Mr.  Barnes testifies that sometime after the  earliest
experiments with ether, Mr. Morton showed him an apparatus for administer-
ing it, with no  provision for the admission of air; and although told by  Mr.
Barnes that the  admission of the air was indispensable, he gave proof, as late as
December last, that he was  not aware of the danger of too great an exclusion
of it.   At that time Dr.  N. C. Keep,  to whom we are much indebted for his
valuable experiments and observations  upon the best mode of using the ether,
found it  difficult to induce  him to  permit the air to pass  freely through his
apparatus."
   Mr. Morton's own conduct and admissions, in the earlier period of this con-
troversy, prove that he could not have experimented with sulphuric ether, or
have  suspected  the existence of its anaesthetic properties, previously to the
30th of September.  Mr. Eddy, Morton's professional adviser and co-partner
in the patent, admits that  Morton never informed  him in  relation to his
experiments with  ether.   Yet,  Mr. Eddy declares that  he advised Morton,
that he could  not take out an exclusive  patent for the discovery, because, to
use Mr. Eddy's  own words, " Dr. Jackson had suggested to him the  pro-
priety of experimenting with  ether."   Mr.  Morton, although  urging his
objections to Dr. Jackson's having any share in the patent, made no allusion to
his alleged  previous  experiments.   It is  not to  be conceived that  he would
not have communicated  all his claims, and particularly this, upon  which he
now almost  exclusively rests, to  his partner and legal adviser.
   Mr. Morton's unqualified admissions to many of  his assistants and agents,
from  the  first of  October,  1846, till February, 1847, prove  his later state-
ments untrue, as to previous experiments, and show conclusively that he was
indebted to Dr. Jackson for his first knowledge of the  anaesthetic properties of
sulphuric  ether, and for instructions how to apply it.   Extracts from deposi-
tions, proving  these admissions, are here presented.  All the witnesses are men
of mature age, and none of them have been discredited.

   Says D.  P. Wilson, of Boston:

   " Respecting  the authorship of the discovery, I do not  feel the least embar-
rassment or doubt; for my opinion has been wholly founded upon the narrative
and declarations of Mr.  Morton, in which, uniformly  and without reserve, he
ascribed its authorship to  Dr. Jackson,   never speaking of himself otherwise
than  as the first and fortunate person to whom  Dr.  Jackson  had  communi-
cated it.
   " I here  speak of the time which intervened between  the eleventh day ot
November,  A.  D. 1846, or thereabouts, and the  month  of February  then
next ensuing,  when Morton first claimed  the discovery to be his own.
   " On the aforesaid eleventh of November, I concluded a contract with Mr.
Morton to  become an assistant in  his office.  During this  month I had con-
versations  with Morton, in  which  he expressly stated that ' he was indebted
to Dr. Jackson  for the idea of the new application of  ether, and had  received
instructions from him how to apply it.'"

   Said Morton  to  Wilson,  in concluding an  account of the interview of the
30th  of September, with Dr. Jackson:

   " ' Dr  Jackson directed  me to apply the vapor of pure sulphuric ether with
                      4 
2(i
a handkerchief or folded cloth, which would render the patient perfectly insen-
sible,  when I could extract  her teeth without her knowing  it.  1 seized upon
the new idea,  and immediately  commenced my first  experiments with  the
ether.'
   " This narrative, received from Morton's own lips, was confirmed by state-
ments  and expressions made by him, and  by the assistants  and others  con-
nected with the office, from day to day."

   Says Alvah Blaisdell,  of Boston:

   " At that time — on or about the last of September or the first of October,
— I had a conversation with Dr.  Morton to the following effect:  I asked him
how he succeeded in the  application of ether.   He  replied, ' most  satisfac-
torily.'   I then asked him how  he had dared to use an agent so powerful.
He told me that he had received the most positive assurance from Dr. C. T.
Jackson, that it was perfectly safe.   I remarked, ' then you have consulted Dr.
Jackson ? '  He replied in the affirmative, and stated that the idea of employ-
ing sulphuric ether was first suggested to him by Dr. Jackson.  I  asked him
thereupon if it was  Dr.  Jackson  who made the discovery.  Mr.   Morton
at once answered, 'that he  did, and that  Dr.  Jackson had communicated
it  to him, with instructions  as  to  the  proper mode  of applying the ether;
and that having acted in accordance with his advice,  his  (Morton's) prac-
tice had been  successful, the  result in every way answering to Dr. Jack-
son's  predictions.'
   " I met Dr. Morton frequently  afterwards, and conversed with him upon
the subject of  ether.  He uniformly made the same declarations, awarding the
discovery to Dr. Jackson."

   Says J. A.  Robinson, of  Salem:

   " From Morton's conversation, I  came to the conclusion  that Dr.  Jackson
was the discoverer of the new application of  ether.  I remember asking Mor-
ton, ' how he could sell a right to the new agent, Dr. Jackson having dis-
covered it.1   He replied distinctly,  and  in substance, 'that he had purchased
of Dr.  Jackson the exclusive  right  to the discovery,  and patented it.'  Mor-
ton unreservedly admitted that there was some one behind himself connected
with the discovery as its originator, and that that person was Dr.  Charles
T.  Jackson."

   Says Nathan B. Chamberlain, of Boston:
  "I am certain that this [interview]  was  several days  after the first  of
October,  of the year 1846.  Mr.  Morton, by his  conversation at  that time,
rave me  every reason to believe that some one  other than himself was the dis-
coverer of the 'preparation.'  He said distinctly, that it was the suggestion of
another,  and, from  Mr. Morton's manner of speaking of Dr. Jackson in con-
nection with the ' preparation,' as he did quite frequently during the interview
no doubt was left on my mind that  Dr. Jackson was the discoverer."
Says Allen  Clark,  of New York:
" During  the whole  interview [December, 1846], Dr.  Morton 
27
claimed to  have discovered the new use of ether himself, but  left a full and
decided impression on my mind that  Dr. Charles T. Jackson, of Boston, was
its sole discoverer, and that he (Dr.  Jackson) had first communicated it to
him.
   "I  have since been greatly surprised  that  Dr.  Morton  should assume to
have  discovered  etherization;   since, from  his own declarations, and the
representations of his agents, I had drawn an entirely different conclusion."

   Says Horace J.  Payne, of Troy, New York:

   " During this interview  [January 2], Dr. Morton stated repeatedly and
emphatically, that  Dr. Charles  T.  Jackson, of  Boston, was the sole discoverer
of the  new  agent  for producing insensibility to  pain, and that Dr. Jackson
had communicated it  to him.   Furthermore,  that all the knowledge which he
possessed in relation to its properties, and its application, had come to him from
Dr. Jackson, and  that he never had any idea of applying sulphuric ether, or
that  sulphuric ether could be applied, for the aforesaid purposes, until Dr.
Jackson suggested it to him, and gave him full instructions."

   Says Daniel S.  Blake, of Boston:

   " On the twenty-first day of December, 1846, I was  employed by Dr.  W.
T. G.  Morton as  his agent to sell  patent rights of the ' letheon;'  and in pur-
suance of my  duty,  as  his  agent,  I  travelled through  parts of New  York,
New Jersey,  Connecticut,  and Pennsylvania,  and sold  rights  to  different
persons.
   " The first  time that I had any conversation with Dr. Morton upon the
subject of the  discovery of the application of sulphuric ether, to the relief of
pain  attending surgical operations, was when  the  discovery had been  lately
made known,  viz., in the fall of 1846.  It was, I  remember, on the day that
the operation in surgery was performed at the Bromfield  House, in which sul-
phuric  ether was used.  I asked Dr.  Morton of the origin of the discovery,
and he then told  me that Dr. Charles  T. Jackson had made the discovery,
and  had communicated  it to him  a  short time previous,  and that he first
applied it under Dr.  Jackson's  directions.
   " Dr. W. T. G. Morton always said,"and gave me to understand in all my
interviews  with him (and I was his agent  in selling patent rights for the use
of the  ' letheon,' or sulphuric  ether,  for about  two months), that Dr. Charles
T. Jackson was the original discoverer of the application  of sulphuric ether to
the relief of pain attending surgical  operations ;  that he (Morton) had, in the
autumn of  1846, first used sulphuric ether, and then had used it and applied
it under the instructions and directions of Dr. Jackson."

   The  only direct  evidence which has been produced to support Morton's  claim
to previous experiments, is  that furnished by the affidavits of  his brother-in-
law Francis Whitman,  William P. Leavitt and Thomas  Spear, three boys in
his 'office and Grenville G.  Hayden, a partner in  dentistry.   The affidavits
of these witnesses were taken in a secret room in Morton's office, on the  same
day  D P  Wilson having been ordered out for this purpose.   If the  testi-
mony of these witnesses  is proved  to  be false,  no consideration is  to be  given
to the  very indirect and  indefinite statements of Messrs. Wightman and Met-

 a6ne of these witnesses (Spear) confessed to  Messrs. Lord and Palmer that 
28
he might have been wrong as to his dates.   The falsehood of his former testi-
mony is now conclusively established by his admissions to Mr. Calvin Angier,
a highly respectable merchant of Boston.
  This  important testimony of Mr. Angier is now published  for  the  first
time.

  " Commonwealth of  Massachusetts, )
                 Suffolk,                 )
                           " City of Boston, December 19, A. D.,  1851.
  " I, Calvin Angier, of said Boston, in said Suffolk county, merchant, do, on
oath, depose and say, that I have known Thomas  R. Spear, junior, from his
infancy, and that I am well acquainted with the father and mother of said
Thomas R. Spear, junior, and that I  have  been in the habit of visiting Mr.
Spear, senior, and that  I  have intimately known  Thomas R. Spear, junior;
that I have had numerous conversations with Thomas R.  Spear, junior,  on the
subject of the ether discovery since its publication to the world, and that he
(said  Thomas R. Spear, junior) has uniformly stated to  me, that he knew
that the ether discovery originated with Dr.  Charles T. Jackson, and that he
knew that W. T.  G. Morton obtained his first knowledge of this discovery of
etherization from Dr. Jackson, and that Mr. Morton had told him (Thomas
R.  Spear, junior) that he had learned from Dr. Jackson, that the inhalation
of the vapor of ether would prevent  any sensation of pain in  surgical  opera-
tions ;  that said Thomas  R. Spear, junior,  declared  to me that he did not
breathe ether vapor until after  Morton told him, that  the  said Morton had
obtained his knowledge of it from Dr. Jackson, and that Dr.  Jackson had
assured him of the safety of inhaling it.  I  think that the  said  Spear  also
seated that he himself had first called on Dr. Jackson to assure himself of the
safety of the  process, before he (said  Spear) had  dared to  inhale it.   I do
further depose and say, that said Thomas R.  Spear, junior, has repeatedly said
to me that the first knowledge of the inhalation  of  the  vapor of sulphuric
ether that Morton had, he obtained from Dr. Jackson ; and that the said Mor-
ton  frequently so  stated to  him, the  said Thomas  R. Spear, junior, and  that
said Morton,  in  his early use of  the said  ether in his dental  operations,
always  attributed his first  knowledge of the discovery to Dr. Jackson; and
further  I do  depose and say,  that said  Thomas R.  Spear,  junior,  only
attributed to  said  Morton, and  all  that  he  attributed to  him (the  said
Morton), was the use of the ether after Dr. Jackson's  prescription,  and that
said Morton deserved credit for its early administration,  but  that said  Morton
was not the discoverer  nor the originator of the discovery ;  and I do further
add. and, under oath, state that  said Thomas R. Spear, junior, told me that he
certainly should not have inhaled the ether if he had  not first had it directly
from the authority of Dr. Jackson, that  it would be safe for him to inhale it.
                           "(Signed,)          CALVIN  ANGIER."

:- Commonwealth  of Massachusetts, )
               Suffolk,                \ ss-
                                " City of  Boston, December 19th,  1851.
  " Then personally appeared the  abovenamed  Calvin  Angier, a party well
known to me, and made solemn oath to the truth of the above affidavit,  to him
by me carefully read, by him in my presence subscribed.
            "(Signed,)          ABRAHAM  JACKSON, Jr.,
                                              " Justice of the  Peace." 
29
   The following is the affidavit of Spear, and it is introduced to show how com-
pletely he has contradicted himself by his admission to Angier.   It  must be
borne in mind that the three other witnesses all refer in facts and dates sworn
to by Spear, and since contradicted by him.   Whitman says that soon after
July, Morton sent William and Thomas out to hire a man to come in and have
an experiment tried upon him.   Leavitt refers to the same  circumstances, and
describes the circumstances of the first inhalation by Spear, without fixing the
date.   Hayden says  that  Morton, in August, 1846, tried  to induce  three
young men in the office to take the gas.
                                           " Boston, March 25th, 1847.
   " I, Thomas R.  Spear, Jr., of Boston, in the State of Massachusetts, depose
and say :
   " That, about the first of August, 1846, at request of Dr. Morton, I inhaled
a portion of ether, which William  P. Leavitt  brought from Brewer,  Stevens
& Co.'s, in a demijohn, in Dr. Morton's office.. The rest of the young men in
the office were afraid  to take it;  but, having  taken  what I supposed to be the
same  before at  the Lexington Academy, I did not  hesitate to take it when I
learned what it was.
   " About a week after  the ether was purchased of Brewer, Stevens & Co.,
Dr. Morton was expecting some  persons at his office to witness an experiment.
and he then offered me a sum of money if I would  be present and inhale the
ether.   I went home and  consulted my parents, and they  advised me not to
go.  I have often heard Dr. M. say, that when he had completed his invention
for extracting teeth without pain, he should be satisfied.
   " Ever after Dr. Hayden came  into the office, Dr. Morton seemed wholly
absorbed in making this discovery,  and had a number of bottles, an India-rub-
ber bag, &c, &c, with which he prosecuted his experiments in the little room
adjoining the front office, where he frequently locked himself in.
   " Dr. Morton offered me five  dollars if I would  get some one to come into
the office,  and to have  an  experiment tvied upon him of  having  a  tooth
extracted while under the operation of gas.  I went, accordingly,  down to the
wharves, in company with  William  P. Leavitt, in order to get some one for
this purpose, but did not get anv one to  have the experiment tried upon.
                                        "THOMAS  R. SPEAR, Jr."

   It was very justly  remarked by Doctors Lord and Jones, in their minority
report, as follows :

   "This  (Spear's)  confession,  under the circumstances,  is   alone sufficient
to decide the  whole  of this  part  of  the  testimony, even  if there were not
abundant  inherent  proof of  its utter   worthlessness.   All  four of  these
witnesses were together in the  office of  Morton.   Their affidavits were  pre-
pared together.   They were  all in the  same interest.   They all profess to
know  and to testify to the same  thing.  If the testimony of one is confessed
to be false in the only essential particular, namely, the date, that of the others
is false likewise.
   " But the falsehood of this vital part of the testimony in  favor of Morton's
pretensions to  prior experiments, does not rest  upon the  confessions of Spear
alone.   This confession is corroborated by the  positive oaths of John E. Hunt,
George H.  Hayden and Don Pedro Wilson.
   "John E. Hunt, an assistant in the office  of Morton in November, 1846,
swears that Morton told him that he (Morton), at that time, namely, Novem- 
30
ber, 1846, had never inhaled the vapor of sulphuric ether, and  that  Spear
assured him, a few days after his entrance into the office, on an occasion  of
inspiring the ether,  that it was the first time that he (Spear) had ever inhaled
it.  (See Appendix.)
   " George H. Hayden of Calais, Maine (see Appendix B), swears that Spear
told him, some time in the month of November, 1846, that the  day before was
the first time  he had ever inspired the vapor of ether.
   " Don Pedro Wilson, an assistant in  Morton's office, says (See  Appendix),
that the first  time he knew of  Spear inhaling the ether was about the middle
of November, 1846, which  corresponds with the statements of the other wit-
nesses.
   " It should be borne in mind, in this connection, that  the  depositions  of
Spear, Whitman, Leavitt and Hayden, were taken a short  time after Morton
found it for his interest to set up pretensions to the original discovery, and it
appears in evidence  that they were never heard, previous to that time, to claim
the discovery for Morton.
   " There is nothing left but the  testimony of Theodore Metcalf  and Joseph
M. Wightman to sustain the pretensions of Morton to experiments for  ascer-
taining the anaesthetic  power of sulphuric ether, prior to  this  interview with
Dr. Jackson on the 30th of September."

   Upon this the minority of the former committee remark :

   " The statement of Mr. Metcalf seems to be too vague to possess much weight
in view of so  great a mass of conflicting testimony.
   " All that  is said by this witness, in  relation to  the conversation between
himself and Mr. Morton about the nature and effects of sulphuric ether,  at the
store  of Burnet, may  be easily explained without supposing that Morton was
engaged, as he alleges  he was, in  any experiments to test  the efficacy of this
agent in the subjugation of pain.
   "The very small  vial, said to be an ounce vial,  alleged   by  Mr. Metcalf to
have been in  the hands of Morton on that occasion,  even supposing him  not to
have mistaken sulphuric for chloric ether, might have been  procured  for use as
an anodyne in his family, or for trial on the nerves of teeth, and  might very
naturally have led to the remarks and inquiries, which are narrated by Met-
calf as having taken place,  as well as to tales of school-boy experiments of its
inhalation, &c, but it  is certainly very improbable that so small a vial was pro-
cured for the purpose of experimenting upon its effects by inspiration.
   "The testimony of  Mr. Wightman is more important, and  unless there is,
on his part, some extraordinary  confusion in the dates of interviews with Mor-
ton, his  statements are brought into direct antagonism to a very formidable
array of testimony,  produced by Dr. Jackson,  to show the entire  ignorance
of Morton of  the  efficacy  of sulphuric ether to remove the sensation of
pain.
   " The affidavit of Mr. Chamberlain, a philosophical instrument-maker, of as
high respectability as Wightman, discloses the fact that Mr. Chamberlain, some
time in the summer of 1846, sent Morton to Mr. Wightman for ' India-rubk-r
bags.'  which were designed  to be  attached to a blow-pipe,  in  Morton's  office,
for some uses  connected with dentistry;  and also the fact  that  he (Chamber-
lain)  was consulted by Morton in regard to the gases proper  to  be used  in
these bags ; and that he saw nothing of Morton after this interview, until some 
31
time in the month of  October following, when he (Morton) further  consulted
with him in regard to an ' ether inhaler,' &c.
  "Now  Mr. Wightman seems, in his statement, to connect these India-rub-
ber bags, which  are  described by Mr. Chamberlain as being  designed  for a
blow-pipe in the summer of 1846, with the inspiration of ether and the '  ether
inhaler,'  respecting  which  Mr. Chamberlain  swears he  was consulted  (and
probably Mr. Wightman was also) by Morton  in the month of October, which
was after the interviews wherein Dr. Jackson  imparted to Morton all  his
knowledge in regard to ether."
  The undersigned is satisfied, after carefully examining all the testimony bearing
upon the point, that the interview of Morton with Mr. Wightman, at  which  the
conversation respecting sulphuric ether took place,  occurred after  the 30th of
September, and after Morton had derived  from Dr. Jackson  the information
respecting the properties of ether.   Morton, in his Memoir, causes it to be dis-
tinctly understood, that he proceeded to Dr. Jackson's office on the  same day
that he had the  interview with Wightman.   He  says, moreover, that on that
day Dr.  Jackson gave him " a flask with a  glass tube  inserted in  it."   Mr.
Mclntyre says in his  deposition : —"I was in the laboratory of  Dr. Charles
T.  Jackson on  the 30th day of September, A. D., 1846, on which day Mr.
W  T  G. Morton called to procure an India-rubber bag for the purpose
declared in my deposition of April 1st, A. D., 1847.  Mr. Morton did not, to
my knowledge, ask  for or take from the laboratory a  glass tube and flask of
any description  whatever, which I should certainly  have known if he had.   A
few days  after the  said  30th of September,  on  the second or  third day of
October  Mr. Morton did call and take from the  laboratory the above appara-
tus."   Mr. George 0. Barnes also testifies,  "that Mr. W. T. G. Morton  did
not, on the 30th day of September, take from  the laboratory of Dr. Charles T.
Jackson a glass tube or flask, or any apparatus whatever  for the inhalation of
sulphuric  ether.  I was in  the laboratory during the whole time that  Mr.
 Morton remained, and heard the conversation between  Dr. Jackson and him-
 self.   He did call, three days after, to procure such apparatus, and Dr. Jackson
 then gave him a glass flask  and tube, with instructions for their use."   These
 depositions leave no doubt that Mr. Wightman was mistaken in the date he
 has given to the interview with Morton.
    " Unless,-therefore, the recollections of Mr. Wightman are  bewildered by
 confounding the occurrences of two conversations with Morton at different
 times, his testimony, though not exactly conflicting with that of Mr. Cham-
 berlain,  is certainly  unsustained  by any other reliable evidence  of Morton's
 early experiments, and  is in  vital conflict with  the  whole current of  proof
 solemnly attested, by a large number of Morton's former agents and  assist-
 ants "
    Finally, the  undersigned believes that the statements of Morton and the
 testimony'of the witnesses who have been within his control, are entitled to no
 credit because there is  conclusive evidence that Morton is  capable of  giving
 and manufacturing  false testimony.   His own acts in relation to this contro-
 versy completely discredit him as a witness.
    It is known that a former committee of Congress  had this subject  under
 consideration.   A report was presented by Mr. Edwards, in behalf of three ot
 the committee,  in  favor of Mr.  Morton's   claims    Two  of the  committee
 reported  adversely to Morton, giving the whole credit of the discovery to Dr.
 Jackson.  No  action upon  the  subject  was ever had  by  Congress.   The
 reports of the committee, in fact, were never  called for.  The subject was not 
32
l^ven presented in the Senate;  yet Morton published the  following advertise-
ment in the Boston Atlas of April 14th,  1849 :

                                " A CARD.
   " The  subscriber,  having  returned  from Washington,  begs leave to give
notice to his friends  and patients (Congress having decided  the ether con-
troversy in his favor), that he is now  able to devote his attention to the vari-
ous operations in dental surgery, particularly to the administration of ether.
   " Persons contemplating having artificial teeth inserted  are assured that
nothing can surpass the excellence of his  operations in this department.
                                        " W.  T. G. MORTON, M. D."

   Of this advertisement, Hon. F. W. Lord, a member of the committee before
referred to, in a letter of April 16th, 1849, addressed to Dr. Jackson, and ex-
amined by the undersigned, speaks  in  the following strong language: —
" Morton, too, has advertised that Congress has  recognized him  as the  dis-
coverer of etherization, &c.   This is  quite characteristic of  the unscrupulous-
ness of the charlatan.  How any honorable man  can  allow his  name  to be
associated with the schemes of  this fellow, after the public  announcement of
such downright and deliberate falsehood,  is a mystery to me.
   " The truth is (and Morton knows it) that Congress  has not acted at all
upon the  subject, nor  decided anything.   Three members (of  the House of
Representatives), out of two hundred and twenty-six, have  adopted  a  report
conceding to Morton the chief merit of the discovery, and two of the same body
have denied to him all claim, and the  House ordered,  as  is  usual on all such
occasions,  the two reports to  be printed.   This  is all.    There has been no
action of any kind."
   This statement of Morton could  not  have originated in  a  mistake or a mis-
apprehension.  It was a bold assertion, deliberately published with the  inten-
tion to deceive the public, and to increase his practice  in  dentistry.   This ia
alone sufficient to throw suspicion upon any allegation made  by  Morton.
   The question as to Morton's character  is made by the  report a most perti-
nent one in this issue.  It might have  been one most proper to consider, even
if  the report of the majority had not made it  necessary,  as an act of simple
justice to   Dr. Jackson, to  publish the evidence  which has  been  presented to
discredit Morton as a witness.
   The majority report declares that "the committee have no reason to doubt the
entire truth and accuracy of Morton's statement of experiment upon  himself,
although he cannot verify it  by direct  evidence."   The majority report con-
stantly refers to matters as  established facts,  which are proved only by Mor-
ton's own statement.   He is  admitted as  a witness  in the case, and  no doubt
is  expressed as  to the truth of the  statements made  by him.   Dr. Jackson
remonstrated before the committee  against any weight being  given to Morton's
statements.   He  declared that  he was  a man  of infamous  character, and
therefore  wholly unworthy of credit.    Dr. Jackson, by his counsel, offered to
the committee evidence to prove Morton's infamous character for the purpose
of discrediting him as a witness.   The  committee declined to receive  this evi-
dence upon the  grounds  distinctly declared  by them,  that  the committee
nhould throw out of the question  the  statements of both parties.  This the
committee have not done with respect to  Mr. Morton.   The committee, more-
over, reprove Dr. Jackson for having spoken of  Morton with great bitterness.
and declare that " they deem  it but just to say that Dr. Jackson's charges are 
33
not only not supported, but are wholly inconsistent with  the current proofs in
the case."  Dr. Jackson thus  stands  charged as  a  false  calumniator.   The
undersigned,  therefore, believing  Dr. Jackson to be an honest  and truthful
man, cannot,  without doing him  gross injustice, withhold the evidence as to
Morton's character.   If there is anything harsh or severe in this procedure, it
has been rendered necessary by the course of the majority.
   It will be seen by the evidence  presented by Dr. Jackson to the committee,
published in the Appendix, that his charges against Morton are proved  to the
fullest extent.
   Throwing out of the case,  as we must do, all Morton's own statements and
those of the witnesses peculiarly within his control, and referring to the decla-
rations made by him against his own interests, and to the testimony only of
unimpeachable  witnesses in relation to the  introduction of this discovery, what
are Morton's claims to the discovery of etherization ?
   1.  Anterior  to  Dr. Jackson's  communication to him, on  September 30th,
1846, Morton had no idea that anaesthesia  could be produced by the jnhalation
of any vapor  of any kind.  See  his statements to Dr. Paine, Dr. Heald, and
others.
   2.  He did not go to  Dr. Jackson's  laboratory for  the purpose of procuring
any  means of producing any anaesthetic effect.   See the  statements of Barnes,
Mclntyre and  Dr. Jackson, also  Morton's own declarations to Dr. Paine and
others.
   3.  In  the interview with Dr. Jackson, he made .no allusion to ether before
he had received Dr. Jackson's communications.   See  statements of Barnes and
Mclntyre.   After Dr. Jackson had announced to him his discovery, he did not
then claim  that he had previously had the same idea.   He did not say that he
had  experimented with ether, or show it  at his office to any credible witness.
Nor did  he claim these previous researches  in his  communications with his
patent solicitor.
   4.  Even after he had extracted the tooth without pain, there is no evidence
that he had any idea that ether could be employed in surgical operations.   He
had no idea of  going to the Massachusetts General Hospital until  directed  so
to do by Dr.  Jackson.  See statements of Barnes and Mclntyre and his own
declarations.
   5.  He  did not  take any responsibility in  the early  operations with ether
either at his own office or at the hospital.   See deposition of Wilson, &c.
   6.  He was influenced by no philanthropic purpose in his efforts to introduce
the  use of ether, but  acted purely as a mercantile speculator.   See the fol-
lowing extract  from his circular, dated November 25th,  1846 :

   " I am  now fully prepared to  dispose of licenses to use my invention and
apparatus in  any part of the country upon the following  general terms :

                          TERMS FOR DENTISTS.

       In  cities of 150,000 inhabitants, $200 for five years.
        "    "   "  50,000,  and less than 150,000,  $150 for five years.
         «    "   "  40,000,   "   "   "    50,000,   100 "   "    "
         "    "   "  30,000,   "   "   "    40,000,    87 "   "
         «    "   "  20,000,   "   "   "    30,000,    75  "   "    "
         «    "   "  10,000,   "   "   "    20,000,    62  "   "    "    '
         "    "   "   5,000,   "   "   "    10,000,    50 "    "    "
                         5 
;;4
   " Surgeons' licenses for five years, 25 per cent, on all  charges made for
performing operations wherein the discovery is used, kc, kc.
                                              "W.  T.  G. MORTON."

   What claim and merit has Morton  in relation to this discovery, except that
he confided  implicitly in Dr. Jackson's chemical and  medical knowledge, and
promptly and closely followed his instructions ?
   The undersigned, having  now presented his own views as to the relative
claims of the two principal contestants for the honor of this discovery, has still
imposed upon him the task of correcting many of the  errors both of fact and
reasoning which appear in the report  of the majority.
   The undersigned deems  it unnecessary for him to attempt  to controvert
the position  of the majority report, enforced by so extraordinary an  array of
learned  quotations, that this discovery of anaesthesia, for which the committee
recommend  so munificent  a reward, is, after all, one which has been known in
all ages. - It is difficult, however, to reconcile this view of the majority with
the statement of Dr. John C. Warren, quoted by them as  the very highest
medical authority.  In  a communication  in the  Boston Medical and Surgical
Journal, this eminent surgeon says :  " The discovery of a mode of preventing
pain  in surgical operations has been an object of strong desire among surgeons
from an early period.   In my surgical lectures  I have  almost annually alluded
to it,  and stated the means which I have usually adopted for  the attainment of
this object.  I have also freely declared, that, notwithstanding the  use of very
large doses of  narcotic substances, this desideratum had never been satisfac-
torily obtained."   The  statements of the  majority report, as  to the state of
knowledge  current in the medical world in relation to the  properties of sul-
phuric ether,  before  Dr. Jackson's  experiments  and  opinions  were  known,
demand a more careful consideration;  for it is asserted that Dr. Jackson, previ-
ously to  September 30th, 1846, had  discovered  nothing  that  had not been
known,  or in print, in London, for some years.  The only explanation which
the undersigned  can give  for the  extraordinary opinions expressed by the
majority upon this point, is, that  they have not reflected that they have been
considering  the subject from the present stand-point, and that, in view of the
light which  has been shed upon it  within the last few years, they can form no
correct idea of the obscurity which prevailed in early times.
   The report speaks of the fact, "as well  known to students of chemistry and
medicine, that  the vapor of  sulphuric ether inhaled for a short time allayed
pain."-  It  says that " Dr. Morton's  studies enabled him to know all that was
then  known of  this agent  then familiarly known as  a nepenthe."   It says
"that the stupefying effects of  ether  were well known  to  students and  scien-
tific  men."   Dr. Warren is quoted  to show that the effect  of  the inhalation
of ether in producing  exhilaration and insensibility has been understood for
many years.   It is argued that Mr. Morton, in May, 1845, was in the posses-
sion of all  the knowledge which Dr. Jackson had upon this substance,  as he
then  owned  Pereira's Materia Medica, which contains  the following sentence:
 ' Vapor of ether is inhaled in spasmodic asthma, chronic catarrh, and dyspepsia,
whooping cough, and to relieve the effects caused by the accidental inhalation
of chlorine."
   The undersigned  conceives that the  opinions  and references above given
convey a totally incorrect idea as to the former state of medical knowledge in
relation to   the properties of sulphuric ether.  In the cases  referred to in the
work of Dr. Beddoes, ether was used as a  diffusible stimulus, or at most as an 
35
anodyne like opium.   It was not known as a nepenthe, but as a stimulant like
alcohol, and as a means of producing temporary drunkenness.   Its effects in pro-
ducing stupor and unconsciousness were known, but these effects were regarded
as exceedingly dangerous.   AlthSugh its effects in producing unconsciousness
were  known,  there is not the slightest  evidence that the belief  anywhere
obtained  that it produced insensibility to pain.   Nothipg in Pereira's work
indicates that  ether  produces paralysis  of the nerves  of sensation.   It was
simply recommended  for  the  same  purposes as alcohol and  other  diffusible
stimuli are used;  alcohol having been formerly the usual remedy for suffoca-
tion by chlorine.
   There is nothing in Pereira's work which could have suggested the applica-
tion of ether for anesthetic purposes, while the work, if it ever had been read
by Morton, would  have distinctly warned him from using ether.   This author
speaks of its inhalation as  dangerous, and quotes a case of dangerous stupor as
a caution against its use.   The majority report loses  sight of the fact that the
use of ether to such  an extent as to produce unconsciousness, is spoken ot in
all the medical books as dangerous  and occasionally  fatal.   Brande's Journal
quotes a case of dangerous stupor of  thirty hours' duration.   Christison, in his
work on Poisons, quotes the same case.   Beck's Medical Jurisprudence  and
 Wood and Bache's U. S. Medical Dispensary,  refer to cases  of death produced
 on boys by inhalation of ether from a bladder, the accidents in  this case having
 occured from breathing ether without admixture of air.  All these books contain
 cautions against breathing ether.   These medical authorities were arrayed against
 Dr Jacks°on in his early attempts to introduce ether as an  anaesthetic agent
 bv a highly  accomplished  scientific man, the father of his student, Mr. Joseph
 Peabody    How can it be said that  Dr. Jackson was simply posted up m the
 current medical knowledge upon this subject, when, in opposition to all medical
 authorities, he had declared and proved by his own bold experiment that the
 inhalation of ether, to such  an  extent as  to produce insensibility,.and to such
 an extent as  never  had  been voluntarily and deliberately  attempted before,
 was perfectlv  safe; when he had discovered, what was never before  suspected
 the conditions upon  which that safety depends, and had inferred and declared
 the conviction, never before expressed  by any other person, that the  severest
 surgical operations could  be performed without pain  under its influence i
    The views of  the  majority upon  this point are in  direct  opposition to the
 opinion of the great surgeon Velpeau,* who, speaking in the French Academy
 upon the  absurd  claims  which had been set up in France  to a  knowledge ot
 the effects of  ether,  says, " That which is new is the proposition of rendering
 patients upon whom we wish to operate  wholly insensible to pain, by means ot





  Operatoire Paris ,183'J, tome 1., p. 82 .            {h .  .    t  rmitted to pursue at this
    « To avo d pain in  ^^^K^^^SiS are two words which never are pre-
  S^*^^^^^^?^^ of patients, and it is  necessary to admit the

  ^t^ M. Bouisson, » * ^^^^
  says  : « Happily these decrees \P^\^^l,en one of the first to recognize it.  The
  ments without appeal, and A1.  ^u  properties of ether and of chloroform, the application
  rigorous determination ot 1«^ J*P^ve come to   ove that progress was possible, and
  £t n^w^Xen^;?^ Uie^,e of humanity,'- p. 48. 
36
applied this means to a diseased man."   If such knowledge was possessed by
the medical world in relation to anaesthetic agents, and particularly sulphuric
ether, as the majority report labors to demonstrate, then no discovery has been
made by either party, and the proposition  to  give a national  reward to any
claimant for the discovery is  an  outrage; then  the  acclamation which has
resounded throughout the civilized world, and in every hospital and academy in
Europe  and America, that this is the greatest discovery of the age, has been
an ignorant, an idle clamor !
   An attempt is  made  by the majority to show that Dr. Jackson's acts and
omissions, in the early stages of the public introduction of ether  as an anaes-
thetic agent, render it improbable that he was the discoverer of  etherization.
They say, " From the 30th of September until the 2d day of January, during
which time this discovery passed successfully the experimentuin cruris, Dr.
Morton was in full and sole undisputed possession.   It was not until some-
time after  the  trial  of  the operation in a capital case had been made and
proved successful, that a  claim was publicly set up  by any one to the honor,
or share in the honor,  of the discovery."  Again,  the majority  report  says,
" During all this time Dr. Morton alone claimed the discovery and conducted the
experiments, etc., and not until all was  complete and completely  verified, not
until some  time after the operation of the 2d of  January, 1847, did any rival
appear and publicly claim the  discovery, or even  a participation  in  it.   Sub-
sequently to  this time  claims were  urged  by  Dr. Jackson  and Wells."
Nothing can be more at variance with the  facts than these  statements.   Dr.
Hitchcock's affidavit shows that Dr. Jackson  communicated the  discovery to
him, and claimed the authorship, on the 3d of October, four days only after the
communication to Morton.   Dr. Hitchcock says, that " At this interview, Dr.
Jackson related to him the circumstances under which  he had communicated
the discovery to Dr. W.  T. G. Morton,  and also gave his  opinion relative to
the safe and judicious demonstration of the new agent.   Mr. Henry Sumner,
in a letter to Dr. Jackson, of  March 16th, 1852, says:  " I can from my own
knowledge  state that you did claim the discovery of  etherization from the first
public  announcement of it.  Indeed, your statements to  me, previous to this
announcement, were such as to induce in my mind the idea that you were over-
sanguine in regard to the results of your  discovery."   Dr. Jackson's claims
to the discovery were asserted  daily and constantly, not by newspaper adver-
tisements, it is true, but in every mode  which  was consistent with his personal
dignity and self-respect.
   At that time  no  formal public reclamation  was necessary on Dr. Jackson's
part.   Dr.  Jackson's claim to  this discovery was not denied.  Morton and his
associates then simply exaggerated the merit of his connection with  the verifi-
cation.   On or about the  middle of November, Dr. Jackson proceeded to take
the most formal and deliberate course for asserting and  proving his claim  to
this discovery, before a meeting of eminent scientific, legal and medical gentle-
men, convened for that  purpose at his laboratory.   The occurrences at that
meeting  are thus described by Charles G. Loring, Esq., well known as one
of the most eminent practitioners of law  in  Boston,  in the following  letter
addressed to the undersigned:
                                            "Boston, March 26th, 1852.
   " Upon  recurring to  a  memorandum-book  kept  by  the clerks  in  my
office. I  find  that an entry  is there made  of  my attending a meeting  at
Dr. Jackson's  house in November, 1846.  I have a very distinct recollec-
tion of  the event,  although   I should not  otherwise   have  been able  to 
37
designate the month or year.  At that meeting were  present  Dr. John C.
Warren, Dr. Ware, Dr. Gay, Mr. Joseph Peabody, Francis B. Hayes,  Esq.,
and myself, and  I think  that Dr.  Hale  was also present.   I  understood
that it was  called  in pursuance of the advice which I had given in conference
with Mr. Hayes,  that, as  the subject  was  one involving momentous conse-
quences, and concerning  which it was desirable  to proceed advisedly and
safely, and  one which  from its  nature required  the  opinions of  scientific
gentlemen,  it was expedient to have the matter submitted  to  their considera-
tion in our  presence, that we  might advise with intelligence and confidence.
   "At the meeting Dr. Jackson made a full statement of his claims and of
the circumstances which led to his alleged discovery, and of those which he
represented  as  having taken place between him and Mr. Morton, and which
induced him to  make an experiment;  but whether this statement was in writing
or verbal, aided by written memoranda, I cannot tell; though my impression
is that it was mainly in  writing.   He did  exhibit evidence in support of his
claims, all of which I cannot  recall to mind.   But I remember that Mr. Pea-
body made  a very  minute and  convincing statement of circumstances  that
occurred while  he was in  Dr. Jackson's office, and that another  young  man
made  one of what  took  place when Mr. Morton came to bring an  instrument
to Dr. Jackson  for inhaling, if my memory is faithful.
   "I cannot state how far the other gentlemen were satisfied, but my own
conviction was. entire that Dr. Jackson was  entitled, as between him  and Mr.
Morton, to  the  entire merit of the discovery, and no intimation of  a  contrary
opinion was suggested at  the meeting.  I inferred that the other gentlemen
were of  the same  opinion, if they did not express  it at  the time, and I have
ever since acted confidently as the legal adviser of Dr. Jackson on  that behalf
whenever called upon by him."

   The undersigned has examined a paper, stated  by  Dr. Jackson to  be  a
memorandum or brief of the communication made by him at this meeting.  In
this the discovery is claimed by Dr.  Jackson to its full extent.  What course
could  Dr. Jackson have pursued for taking  a more formal and absolute posses-
sion of this discovery than the one above described ?   This letter of Mr. Lor-
ing shows  how  purely fanciful is the hypothesis of the majority report, that
Dr. Jackson had not, prior to the  operations of December 1st, " fully made up
his mind to claim  the discovery."
   No such formal claim was necessary on Dr.  Jackson's part;  for, in the first
communications made in relation to this discovery before any scientific bodies,
Dr. Jackson  was distinctly recognized as  the author.   The following  letter
of Hon. Edward Everett,  submitted  to the committee, but which has  never
been published  (a  letter to the same effect, presented to a former committee,
having been " lost" by the chairman), shows conclusively how completely in
error  the majority are in asserting that Dr.  Morton was in sole and undisputed
possession of the discovery:
r                                       " Cambridge, 21 October, 1851.
   " Dr. C. T. Jackson, — Dear Sir  : I readily comply with your request that
I would furnish you with a statement of my impressions as to the discovery
of etherization.   I have always considered it to have been made by you.  My
first knowledge of this discovery was derived from  an account of it given at a
meeting of  the  American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Boston, on the 3d
November,  1846. by Dr. Henry J. Bigelow, of that city.   Dr. Bigelow  after
describing the dental operations performed  by  Dr. Morton under the influence 
38
of the newly discovered ' compound ' (as it was  then called), stated that Dr.
Morton had derived his knowledge of the substance used from you.
   " The next day I had occasion to deliver  an address at the opening of the
Medical College; and in preparing that address for publication, I appended  a
note to it, from which  I extract the following sentences :
   " • I am  not  sure that,  since these remarks were delivered, a discovery has
not been announced,  which fully realizes the  prediction of  the  text.   I allude
to the discovery of a method of producing a  state of temporary insensibility
to pain, by the inhalation of a prepared vapor.   A full account of this discov-
ery is given in a paper by  Dr.  Henry J. Bigelow, in the  Boston Medical and
Surgical Journal, for the 18th of November,  1846.  Dr.  Bigelow ascribes its
first suggestion to Dr. Charles T. Jackson, and its application, under his advice,
for the purpose of mitigating pain, to Dr.  W.  T. G. Morton, both of Boston.'
   " Such was the nature and the source of the impressions  formed by me at
the time, relative  to  the discovery of this wonderful anaesthetic agent.   My
address was published at the request of the medical class,  and had,  I suppose,
the usual circulation.   I believe it was the  first  non-professional publication
in which etherization was  alluded  to.   I am  not  aware that the manner in
which  I stated the facts of the discovery was objected  to for several weeks;
when a controversy relative to priority unhappily arose.   In that controversy,
I have neither taken nor wish to take any part.   I have read several  publica-
tions on both sides of the question ; and several have appeared which I  have
not read.   Nothing has come  to  my knowledge which shakes  my  original
impressions  as above stated.
            "I remain, dear Sir,  with much regard,
                                        " Very  truly, yours,
   "A true  copy.               "(Signed),      EDWARD  EVERETT.
   " Attest,  Dr. A. D. W. Martin."

   The majority have presented some purely  original reasons for the assertion
that Dr. Jackson, until the first capital operation, had no fixed confidence in
the success of the  new anaesthetic  agent.   The  chief  merit of originality  is
in the invention of the facts upon which these reasons are founded; for it will
appear that they exist  simply in the imagination of the majority.   The under-
signed particularly refers  to the comments of the  majority upon the course
which it is  asserted  he  pursued in relation  to two letters sent to M.  E. de
Beaumont,  announcing  the discovery.   The  report says, in substance, that
Dr. Jackson,  after he  had nearly made up his mind to claim the discovery as
his own, on the 13th of November, enclosed to De Beaumont a  paper with
directions to file it, but not to break the seal  until he directed.   " This paper,"
it is said, " its seal and custody, show that  Dr. Jackson  knew how to save a
secret and yet preserve the evidence of discovery;  that he hastened to take a
formal contingent possession of  this discovery in Europe, before he witnessed,
even as a spectator, a single operation under the influence of the new amesthetic
agent. It seems that he had not yet fully made up his mind to claim the discovery.
He wanted  further verification  before he took the step of announcing it as his
own.   He therefore directed the letter, making claim to the discovery,  to be
deposited, sealed in the  Academy,  not to  be  opened until he should direct."
   " The success of  the first of December removed  all doubt.  He therefore
wrote the last letter on that date, directing  M. E. de  Beaumont to open the
sealed packet."
   Dr. Jackson's statement of  the facts connected with this  correspondence is 
39
as follows : — After writing his fetter, dated  November  13th, he  took  it to
Robert II. Eddy, Morton's solicitor and co-partner.  He declared to Eddy his
intention of appealing to the French Academy of  Sciences, and told him that
he intended to  send the letter, which he  then exhibited, to E. de Beaumont,
for that  purpose.   R. H. Eddy, and Caleb Eddy, the father of the former,
begged  Dr. Jackson not  to send his letter, saying that they would '' do what
is right" towards  him.   By  their solicitations, Dr. Jackson was induced to
delay sending the letter for half a  month, or until  the next steamer sailed.
Previously to the sailing of the steamer of the first of December,  Dr. Jackson
called again upon Mr.  Eddy, and showed him three letters, which he intended
to  send  to  France  by  the steamer.    Two  addressed to  Monsieur  E.  de
Beaumont, one dated  November 13th, and the other dated  December 1st;
the third addressed to the King  of France, Louis  Philippe.  Dr.  Jackson
states  that  Mr. Eddy and  his father  replied, " Send away as soon as you
please; we secured it by the last steamer ; you are too late ;  some one has been
put to sleep in  France, and in England too, by this time."   Dr.  Jackson im-
mediately sent the two letters  addressed to M. E. de Beaumont, enclosed in
one envelope or seal, and  desired  M.  E. de Beaumont to communicate  their
contents to the Academy of Sciences.
   In one of the letters — that  of 13th  of November, 1846 — he described his
discovery, and  requested that a commission should be appointed  to  test it in
France.   He declared the discovery to  be his own, and that he had induced a
dentist in Boston  to make use  of it in preventing the  pain  incident to the ex-
traction of teeth,  and that  he  had  requested Dr. Warren  to test  its power in
preventing the pain of a capital operation at the Massachusetts General  Hos-
pital.
   In the letter dated December 1st, he communicated to M.  E. de  Beaumont
the fact  that  claims  for a patent in  France would  be presented by R. H.
Eddy, the co-partner  of Morton, and  he desired  the  Academy to  take  such
action as would frustrate  that scheme.  In this letter he expressed no desire to
secure a patent for  himself, but desired that his rights, as a discoverer, should
be protected in such manner as might be proper.   He  did not  express a wish
that the letters should be placed in a sealed packet.  But M. Milne Edwards,
one of the physiologists of  the Academy, and a perpetual  secretary, to whom
M.  E. de Beaumont showed Dr. Jackson's letters, erroneously supposing that
Dr. Jackson desired to secure  a  patent in France,  advised that both letters be
placed in paquet cachete.
  These statements of Dr.  Jackson are confirmed by the following letter from
M.  Elie de Beaumont, which has been  examined by the undersigned :

                             [TRANSLATION.]
                                             " Paris, 3d January, 1847.
  " My dear Sir,— I have received duly the  letter which you had the  good-
ness to do me the  honor  to write to me  from Boston, the first of  December
last;  also that of an older date which was enclosed with it.   I have read with
lively interest the expose of the important discovery with which you have en-
riched  the art  of healing; your double letter arrived on Sunday, the  20th
December.  My first movement was to  communicate  your  discovery to the
Academy of Sciences at its session of 21st December,  and for that purpose  I
communicated it to one of the perpetual secretaries, M. Flourens, who is one
of our most  distinguished  physiologists, and  who comprehended at once its
importance. 
40
   " By an accidental circumstance, the correspondence could  not be read that
day, which hindered the communication from being read.   During the interval
between this session and that of the Monday following,  28th December, I car-
ried your  letter to be  read to another of our physiologists of the Academy, M.
Milne Edwards.   This last made the observation that your object being to take
out a patent  for  invention,  it was necessary to omit reading  the letter to  the
Academy, because, if it were read, your method would be printed in the Compfps
Rendus and in the journals, and, according to the  laws, so soon as a method
is printed, it cannot become the subject  of a patent:  consequently,  in  order
to preserve all your  rights, with the dates  of the arrival  of your letters  in
Europe,   I  have  enclosed  this  double letter in  a sealed  packet   (paquet
cachete),  which I deposited with  the Secretary of the Institute.   This packet
bears for   subscription:—-Sealed packet  relative to a Physiological and
Medico-chinirgical  discovery,  sent  by Dr. Jackson,  of Ilos/ou,  United
States, and deposited in his  name by 31. Elic  de llcaumont,  28//t of
December, 1846,'  and it has been mentioned in these terms in the session of
28th December, and it has also been noticed in the Comptes Jtandus of that
session, which will be published  on the 3d of January.   Your letter, enclosed
in the packet, bears very distinctly the post-mark of the  day  of its arrival  in
Paris (20th December).  The depositing of similar packets is very frequent,
both by members of  the Academy and by other persons who wish to secure
priority of a discovery previous  to divulging it.
   "When you desire, we can ask the opening of  the packet  and the publica-
tion of its contents ; but I ought to inform you that the Academy has nothing
to do with the delivery of patents.
   " Accept,  I pray you, the  assurance  of my  distinguished sentiments of
esteem.   Your affectionate servant and friend,
                          "(Signed)     L.  ELIE  DE  BEAUMONT.
   " Paris, January 6th, 1847.
   "To Dr. C. T. Jackson, Boston, Massachusetts."
Post mark, January 7th, 1847.

   What  act or  omission,  on the part of Dr. Jackson, can be referred to, to
prove the extraordinary statement of the  majority, that he did not claim  the
discovery, except his  refusal to trumpet forth his claims to the discovery, as
his adversary had done in advertisements in  the papers ?  His course in this
respect was such as suited the feelings of delicacy of a gentleman  and a man
of science.  He  expressly refused to give Morton a certificate, the next morn-
ing after  the operation was  performed by the latter, that the application of
ether was safe.   Not because  he had any  doubt  of it,—for he had assured
Morton, in the most unequivocal manner, the day before, in the presence of two
witnesses, of its  safety, and the simple fact  that Morton applied to  him for
the certificate of safety, shows that this application was founded upon Dr.
Jackson's previous assurances of safety,— but for the obvious,  and most natural
reason, that he did not wish to figure in Morton's quack  advertisements.
   How different  from the notions of the majority upon this matter are the fol-
lowing  sentiments uttered  by a distinguished peer of France, in a  country
where charlatanry and ignorant pretension rarely find sympathy and  support.
   In a discussion which took place in  the Chamber of Peers,  at the sitting of
June 30th, upon an article  prohibiting medical advertisements, M. le Compte
Beugnot remarked as follows: —"It is alleged, that, by the article under dis-
cussion, important discoveries, such as that of vaccination, would be prevented 
41
 from being made  known.   I do not  know what occurred at the epoch when
 vaccination wras discovered ;  but this I well know, that, for all the great discov-
 eries of which we  have been  the  witnesses in our own times, their authors
 have not had  recourse to any of those means of publishing which we wish to
 proscribe.   I  ask  if the illustrious Laennec has employed newspaper notices
 and advertisements to spread and make known his great discovery of ausculta-
 tion ?  / ask, also, if M. Jackson,  who  has just immortalized his name
 by the discovery of etherization, has employed these means to spread and
 introduce  among us  the discovery which  he has  made ?   If Dr. Civiale
 for lithotrity,  if M. Pelletier  for the discovery of  sulphate  of quinine, have
 employed newspaper notices and advertisements in the public journals, and all
 those other means which we  wish to proscribe 1   No, no !   They have not had
 recourse to these means, which are resorted to only by charlatans."
   The majority drew inferences unfavorable to Dr.  Jackson's claims from  his
 unfortunate connection with Mr. Morton  in a patent for the application of this
 discovery.   Dr. Gay, in his statement, thus remarks upon this transaction: —

   "An impression  unfavorable to  Dr.  Jackson's  just claims  has arisen  in
 some minds, in consequence of his signing a petition  for letters patent, in which
 Mr. Morton is represented as a joint discoverer with him.   It  is well known to
 Dr.  Jackson's friends, that he always regarded the  position of one engaged in
 scientific pursuits as a profession — as an elevated  one ;  and deemed it a sort
 of impropriety to procure  letters patent  for the practical application of a sci-
 entific discovery.   He  himself never would have procured one merely for  his
 own pecuniary benefit,  in a case so important to the interests of humanity.
   " The facts are these :  Mr. Morton applied to a solicitor of patents to take
 one  out for himself.  The opinion of the  solicitor  was, that  the  patent laws
 would  permit  Mr. Morton to take out a patent on account of  the  part he had
 in the new  application; and  he further stated to Dr. Jackson that Mr. Morton
 would assuredly take out one in his own name, and  he urgently advised him to
 unite with Mr. Morton in applying for a patent, to  be issued  in Mr. Morton's
 name, in order that his own  rights to the discovery might be recognized in the
 first paper  relating to the new application of ether filed at the  Patent Office.
 He observed, if Mr. Morton should take out a patent himself, and thus  pro-
 cure a kind of recognition at the Patent  Office of his having been the discov-
 erer, he might afterwards refer to this recognition in proof of it.   The solicitor
 remarked to Dr. Jackson, that, should he  take out the  patent with Mr. Morton,
 he might make over to him his own share of  it, and that he would not then be
 a partner with him in holding it.   As Dr. Jackson  had great confidence in
 the solicitor, both  as a friend and  in his professional capacity, he, after  long
 hesitation, consented to the plan proposed.   There is no doubt whatever in the
 minds of Dr.  Jackson's friends, that  he consented to it for the sake of pre-
 venting Mr. Morton from holding a legal instrument in his possession, with his
own name alone in it as the discoverer."

   Dr. Jackson's own statement in regard to this  transaction, in his letter to
 Baron Humboldt, although resting solely upon his own word, bears strong evi-
dence of probability.  He says:   "Finding that  I  was in  great danger  of
losing the credit of my discovery, I was foolish enough to listen to the advice
of the  patent solicitor,  Eddy, whom I did not at  that time  suspect of being
interested with Morton in his  attempt to rob me of my discovery; and by his
pretended friendly advice I allowed my  name, under the following protest, to 
4J
he used in  procuring  letters patent.   This document I found was  not the  one
that Mr. Eddy actually sent to the Patent Office, and that discovery led to  an
investigation proving  that Mr. Eddy was a co-partner with Morton.*
   " The protest dictated by me, and written in my presence by Mr. Eddy, was
as follows :
   " ' Dr. Jackson  is extremely unwilling to  take out a patent  for  anything
applicable to the relief of human  suffering ;  but,  in order to secure the honor
of this discovery, and to conform to the laws of his country in transmitting hi.s
right to another, consents,' &c.
   " Under his usual power of attorney, Mr. Eddy altered this as follows, and
without my knowing it at the time I signed it:  ' Dr. Jackson, willing to ben-
efit Mr. W. T. G. Morton, assigns to him his rights and interest, and requests
the commissioner of patents to issue the patent in the name of  W. T. G. Mor-
ton,' or words to that effect.   Trusting that my injunctions had been faithfully
carried out  in the  papers, I signed them without reading  them, and that was
the origin of the whole  mystery of my name having  been associated with that
of Mr. Morton in this patent so improperly obtained."
   The strong fact  which confirms this statement, and furnishes a motive for
the conduct of the patent solicitor, otherwise  inexplicable,  is, that the records
of the Patent Office show that Mr. Eddy had the interest  in the patent of which
Dr. Jackson speaks.  [See Appendix.)
   The undersigned believes  that  he has now established, in direct contradic-
tion of the  assertion of the majority, that Dr. Jackson's own conduct and bear-
ing, in reference to this discovery  and its verification and  presentation before
the public, from the 30th of September, 1846, down to the time that it was fully
established,  prove that he was,  and did believe himself to be, the discoverer.
It is still necessary to controvert one position  of Dr. Jackson's adversaries,—
that he had not full faith in the efficiency of his discovery.  This  position rests
solely upon the often  quoted statement of Mr. Caleb Eddy.  Mr. Eddy, after
relating  a  conversation  with Dr.  Jackson, remarks: "I said to him,- 'Dr.
Jackson, did you know at such a  time, that after a person had inhaled ether,
his flesh could  be cut with a knife without his experiencing  any pain ?'  He
replied, • No;  nor  Morton  either.   He is a reckless man for using it as  he
has ; the chance is, he will kill somebody  yet.'  ''
   It must   be remembered  that  Caleb  Eddy is the  father of  the patent
solicitor, who  induced Dr. Jackson  to enter into the patent,  and who was a
partner of  Morton in the sale of patent licenses;  that, at the  time Mr. Caleb
Eddy's letter was written, the prospect of vast fortunes to be  realized by the
sale of  patent rights, had  been  destroyed by Dr. Jackson's course.  The
younger Eddy's conduct, in inveigling Dr. Jackson  into the  patent arrange-
ment, had broken up all friendship which formerly existed between the Messrs.
Eddy and Dr. Jackson.   Whatever Mr. Eddy says  is spoken under the influ-
ence of strong personal animosity.  But  little weight can, therefore, be given
to the narrative of a conversation given  by one*whose  prejudice would have
led him  to remember only what was against  Dr. Jackson's interest.   More-
over, it is impossible that Dr. Jackson could have made such admissions against
his own rights, when he  went to Eddy's house for the very purpose of remon-
strating against Morton's being connected with the patent.   That Dr. Jackson
regarded Morton as a reckless man,— that he was afraid Morton would kill

  * Sec annexed copy of an assignment, from W. T. G. Morton to R. H. Eddy, of one-fourth of
his rights in a patent then about to be procured. 
43
somebody on account of his recklessness in the mode of administering ether,
— that he regretted that he had entrusted the verification of his discovery to
such a man,— is doubtless true;  but that he  had no doubt of the efficacy of
this  agent in the severest  cases of surgical practice,  and regarded it as per-
fectly safe, when properly administered,  is proved by  abundant  testimony.
Mr. Peabody says:   " I returned to  Dr. Jackson's laboratory about a  week
after he had communicated his discovery to Mr. Morton, and since that time
have been constantly with him;  and I can most positively state that not at any
time has he shown the least want  of confidence in the importance of his appli-
cation-  and not for a  moment did he undervalue it, nor  has he ceased to
assert his claims as the sole discoverer."
  The following letter of Mr. Henry  Sumner, a respectable gentleman, nevfcr
before published, is perfectly conclusive as to Dr. Jackson's faith in this appli-
cation :
                                            '.'Boston,  April 10th,  1849.
  " Dear Sir,— Calling at your office a day or two after you had communi-
cated your discovery to Mr. Morton, of the use of sulphuric ether as an agent
for destroying  pain in the  extraction of teeth, and some days before its appli-
cation in surgical operations at the  Massachusetts General Hospital,  I met Mr.
Morton  there, who wished  to ascertain from you some means of disguising the
odor of the ether.  I distinctly recollect hearing you, at the same interview, affirm,
with great  confidence  and enthusiasm, that the severest surgical operations
could be performed upon patients  under the influence of that agent, without
giving  them the slightest pain.   This,  of course,  struck  me with surprise ;
but many days did not elapse  before your most sanguine  expectations were
realized, and the world astonished with one of  the most remarkable discoveries
of the age.   I  trust you will ere  long receive the award of merit due  such
distinguished service rendered to suffering humanity.
            " I am, respectfully and sincerely, your friend,
                                               "HENRY  SUMNER.
  "To  Dr. Charles T. Jackson, Boston."

  The only answer required to the letter of  Mr. Edward Warren, published
in the minority report  in support of the position  now controverted, is the fol-
lowing extract from the deposition of Mr. Wilson, given in May, 1847 :
  " Mr. Edward Warren, the author of a pamphlet supporting Morton's claims
to the discovery, was directly interested  in Morton's  patent.   There was a
contract in writing between them, by the terms of which it was  provided that
Warren should receive ten per cent, of the  proceeds of all sales  under the
patent.   The original  contract I copied myself, at Morton's request, at a time
when a large sum of money was expected to be realized from the patent."
  The majority have  attempted to discredit Dr. Jackson's statements of the
incidents of his  early experiments, by declaring that " each successive letter
written by him. in relation to these  experiments,  states the  case  more  strongly
than the last  preceding;  and  that the facts superadded in  the latter letters
are  those which alone  give  novelty and importance to his experiments."   This
the  undersigned conceives  they  have wholly failed to prove.
  In order to make out their case, and to show that Dr. Jackson observed  in
his first experiments no more than had been stated as having occurred in Dr.
Thornton's practice, they made him  speak of a catarrh having been relieved
by ether; when, in fact, Dr. Jackson has in no case spoken of having suffered 
44
a catarrh, but a severe and painful inflammation of the throat, caused  by the
action of chlorine.
   There is not the slightest  ground for the assertion that any important facts
have been added since his earlier statements.   In Dr. Jackson's letter  to Mr.
J. H. Abbot, of May 19th, describing his first experiments, he speaks of "a
cessation of all pain, and  the  loss of all feeling of external objects, a little
while before and after the loss of entire consciousness."  This was omitted
in his  very brief letter to Dr. Gay, of  May 20th, 1847.   That  this was
accidentally omitted, is proved  by Dr. Gay's pamphlet, to which the letter is
appended.
   Dr. Gay  says, "The history of the discovery has been derived from Dr.
Jhckson himself."
   In recounting the experiments Dr. Gay says:  "Afterwards, still suffering
from the chlorine, he continued the experiment to such an extent as to pro-
duce complete general  insensibility.   Full relief from the suffering was expe-
rienced  before  he became unconscious, and it continued for a short  time after
the insensibility had passed away."   The fact is, Dr. Jackson's letter was not
so full as his oral statements to that eminent physician had been.  All that can
be alleged in relation to these statements is that Dr. Jackson, like other men of
quick intuition, may not always give a full statement and the exact order of his
reasonings in arriving at his results; and, like La Place, may by some persons
be thought to have jumped at conclusions, the steps of which he  supposed all
men of  science would perceive.   All that Dr. Jackson adds in his letter to
Baron  von  Humboldt, are the steps of his reasoning, which he  has often
been told by others  he ought to explain.   No neiv  facts are alleged by him
as to his experiments upon himself, but only a more minute and detailed  analy-
sis of them, and the philosophical explanation of his deductions.  Whatever
may have been the process of his  reasoning, the grand fact  remains, that he
did form these deductions, and that solely  in consequence of his having formed
and  promulgated those  deductions,  suffering  humanity  now rejoices  in the
precious boon of Anaesthesia.
   The majority refer to the  report of the Massachusetts General Hospital as
conclusively  settling this  question of discovery.  They say:  " It was  one  in
every way proper to be tried and  settled by intelligent  men,  a  jury  of the
vicinage ; and it was so  tried by a most appropriate tribunal, the Trustees of
the Massachusetts General  Hospital, at which the  first  public exhibition of
this  pain-destroying power was made.   The question of discovery was tried
before these men, trustees of a scientific corporation, to  whom  Dr. Jackson
was  well known;  and  this board, composed of  men whose  names would do
honor to any scientific institution,  presently after the discovery, near the time
and at the place where it occurred,  gave, by a unanimous voice, its  honor  to
Dr. Morton."
  The undersigned, aware of the weight which had been given to the pretended
investigation of these gentlemen,— none of them, it is true, men of science or
medical  knowledge, or possessing  any fitness for such  an investigation, but
highly respectable  merchants and  financial  men. and doubtless in every way
worthy of the  trust imposed upon them, that of taking care  of the  money
affairs of the corporation,— addressed to each of the  trustees a letter,  of which
the following is a copy :
                                     "  House of Representatives, )
                                          Washington, April, 1852.    \
   " Sir : —Having  learned  that you were one of the Trustees of the Massa- 
45
chusetts General Hospital  in 1847-8,  I am desirous of  obtaining from you
some information which bears upon the ether controversy, now under consider-
ation by a select committee in Congress.
  " Will  you allow  me, therefore,  to  request  your answers to the following
questions ?
  " 1st.  Are you aware that the Trustees of the Massachusetts General Hos-
pital were  authorized  by Dr. Jackson  to sit as umpires  in  the controversy
between him and W. T. G. Morton,  as  to the discovery  of etherization ?
  " Did you, as one of the trustees of the hospital, examine the statements or
evidence in  hehalf of Dr. Jackson's claims to the discovery of etherization, and
has he at  any time appeared before you personally, or  by counsel,  to  support
his claims 1
  " Are you aware that  any such investigation has been made by the trustees
of the hospital as to give a judicial character to their decision in relation  to the
ether  controversy 'I
  "Have you, or not, considered N. I.  Bowditch, Esq., alone responsible for
bo much of the hospital reports of 1847, as relates to the ether controversy'.'
                         " I am, very respectfully,
                                     " Your obedient servant,
                                               "EDWARD STANLY,
                 " Member of Select Committee on the ether question."

  The answers of these gentlemen are given  in the Appendix.   It appears
distinctly, from these answers, that  the trustees of  the hospital were  never
authorized by Dr. Jackson to sit as umpires in this controversy;  that Dr. Jack-
son did not appear before them personally or by counsel;  that no such exami-
nation was  made  by them as to give a  judicial character to their  decision in
relation to the ether controversy;  that  they considered  N. I. Bowditch,  Esq.,
one of the  trustees,  alone  responsible  for so much of  the  hospital report of
1847.  as related to the ether controversy.   It appears, then, that this jury of
the vicinage consisted  of only one person, whose subsequent acts have stamped
him as Morton's chief attorney and agent.
  The undersigned deems  it unnecessary to  expose in detail  the many incon-
sistencies and errors of his  report, although it is proper to inquire whether any
weight is to be given to his opinions and statements. *

  * As the report of the majority of the committee attaches great importance to the report pur-
porting to be that of the Trustees of the Massachusetts General Hospital, and adopts  its " con-
clusions ;"  and as the letters of all the other trustees leave Mr. Bowditch solely responsible for.
everything relating to the ether  controversy contained in that report, a few of the many incon-
sistencies, contradictions, and absurdities into which he has fallen, are subjoined, in order to,
show how far  he possessed the  impartiality, knowledge  and judgment, requisite for his self-
assumed office of arbitrator, and to what degree of respect his " conclusions " are entitled.
  The sole grounds on which Mr.  Bowditch's Report  claims the discovery for Mr. Morton, are
his pretended  " seeking for the discovery," and the acknowledged fact of his first administering
ether to a patient in the operation of extracting a tooth.  He adopts, as "in accordance with
his views," the declaration of Dr. George Hay ward, one of the surgeons of the Hospital, that
"Dr. Jackson first suggested  the use  of ether" in surgery; and the declaration of  Dr. Jacob
Bigelow, one of the physicians of the Hospital, that " Dr. Jackson made partial experiments, and
recommended, but did not make, decisive  ones."  He  admits that Dr. Jackson devised and
communicated to Mr. Morton the experiment performed by the latter,  and gave  him informa-
tion and directions absolutely essential  to its safety and  success ; that  Dr. Jackson had expe-
rienced in  his own person, and  observed  in  Dr. W. F. Channing, the anaesthetic  effects of
sulphuric ether ; that he recommended to Mr. Joseph  Peabody, in March, 1846,  sulphuric
ether to prevent the pain of the operation of extracting two teeth, and gave him full instruc-
tions as to the requisite purity  of the ether and the proper mode of using it, as he did in the
September following to  Mr.  Morton; — and yet, after  all  these admissions,  Mr. Bowditch 
4fi
   A book  has  been exhibited to the committee, entitled,  " A  History of the
Massachusetts General  Hospital, by  N. I. Bowditch, not published.   Boston,
Printed  by John  Wilson  &  Son,   22 School-street,  1851."   In this  book


declares that Mr Morton, by the mere performance of the first painless extraction of a tooth
from a patient under the influence of sulphuric ether, made the great discov ery <.f etherization !
His language is as follows :  " He [Mr. Morton] certainly first administeriKl it [sulphuric ether]
to a patient  ; by su doing, he made the discovery."  In other words, performing with the  hauds
an experiment demised  and committed to him for  performance by another man,  made him the
author of one of the greatest discoveries ever made in  the inductive  science* !
  Sir Humphrey Davy  having, as has been already stated, observed certain anaesthetic effects
produced upon himself by nitrous oxide, suggested that it could ". probably be used with advan-
tage during  surgical operations in which no  great effusion  of blood takes place."   In conform-
ity with this suggestion, nearly  half a century after it had been published, and many years
after  the death  of its  author, Mr. Horace  Wells, of Connecticut,  successfully  administered
nitrous oxide, in several instances, to prevent pain in the extraction of teeth.   Mr. Bowditch, in
his  Report,  in direct contradiction to the  principle involved in his decision  in  favor of Mr.
Morton, decides  that Mr. Wells' "claim, as a discoverer in this matter, must yield entirely to
that of Sir  Humphrey Davy."   Thus, according  to Mr. Bowditch, Mr. Wells and Mr. Morton
performed each an experiment devised and suggested by another  man ; and the former acquired
thereby no right of discovery, and the latter an exclusive  right to one of the greatest discov-
eries of the  age !  Tims, likewise, Davy suggested the probability,  merely, that  nitrous oxide
might be used " with advantage " in slight surgical operations ; and Dr. Jackson drew a legit-
imate philosophical induction from facts that sulphuric ether would certainly and safely anni-
hilate pain  of surgical operations ; — and  yet,  according to  Mr.  Bowditch's  Report,  Davy
becomes an exclusive discoverer,  and Dr. Jackson  no discoverer at all !
  There is no intimation in Mr. Bowditch's Report that Sir Humphrey Davy's claims to discoT-
ery are  impaired, though he did not, as long as he lived,  urge  the trial of nitrous oxide in a
single dental or surgical operation ; while Dr. Jackson, for his failure to cause, though, not his
neglect to  urge,  a like  trial for  sulphuric ether for  less  than  five years, is alleged to have
" thought his opinion of little value," and to have believed in  the  power of  the ether to pre-
vent pain in dental operations only ; and this, though he admits, in another part of his report,
that " his  [Dr. Jackson's] observations and conclusions" had  reference to " surgical opera-
tions. ''
  Though the gross inconsistencies  and contradictions contained  in Mr.  Bowditch's Report
deprive his reasonings  and conclusions of any claim to respect,  his admissions of facts are not
unimportant ; inasmuch as his violent bias against Dr. Jackson, and partisan advocacy of Mr.
Mortou's claims, make it evident that those  admissions must have been extorted from him by
evidence too strong to be assailed in the community where the character of the  witnesses was
known.
  Admissions similar to those of Mr. Bowditch have been  made by the only two  physicians of
Boston, who have published articles in the Boston  Medical Journal against Dr. Jackson's claims
to the discovery, — Dr. Jacob Bigelow, and his son, Dr. Henry J. Bigelow.  The former of these
gentlemen, in an article published in the aforesaid journal, says :  " Dr. Jackson made pirtial
experiments, and recommended, but  did not make,  decisive ones."  Also,  at  a meeting of
physicians, at the close of the  Medical School, March 1, 1K47, the same-gentleman called Dr.
Jackson "the original  suggester" of etherization.  Hon. Edward  Everett, in the letter con-
tained in  this Report, says,  that at a meeting of  the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,
held Nov. 3, 1846, Dr.  Henry J. Bigelow described the early dental operations performed by Mr.
Morton on patients under the influence of ether, and  that  in that communication Dr. Bigelow
stated, that  " Dr. Morton had derived his knowledge of the substance used from Lr.  Jackson."
  Further, in a printed note to an address delivered at the opening of the new Medical C. liege,
Nov. 6,1846, referring  to the discovery of etherization, Mr.  Everett says  : " Dr. Bigelow ascribes
its first suggestion to Dr. Charles T. Jackson, and  its application, under his advice, for the pur-
pose of mitigating pain, to Dr. W. T. G. Morton."  Thus Dr. H. J. Bigelow  conceded to Dr,
Jackson—before the controversy commenced, and when, never having had any communication
with  Dr. Jackson on the subject, he must have derived his information from  Mr. Morton him-
self, whose early experiments he described — all the " knowledge " involved  in  the discovery.
At a later period, as if  discovery  were the work, not of the head but of the hand, he sets forth,
in the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, the following  strange declaration :  " He who ver-
ifies the suggestion, is  the true discoverer."  The statement which he made at the aforesaid
meeting of the American Academy, a* testified to by Mr. Everett,  shows that he means by »u%-
gestion, in this case, both the devising of the decisive  experiment  and the recommending of it
to Mr. Morton ; and by verification, the mere performance of the experiment  committed to
Mr. Morton  by Dr. Jackson ; that is, Mr. Morton's doing what  he had  been taught to d. .
  The admissions, in the city where the facts are best  known, of Mr. Bowditch and the Me^rs.
IJigelow, include everything  that, according to the unanimous decision of mankind,  in the cm"* 
47
 Mr.  Bowditch  has  inserted  a  chapter on the  ether  controversy,  which
 occupies 130 pages of the work.  To use his own words, " The work contains
 nothing new except, perhaps1 the award of the  French Academy, and also a
 note showing the extent to which ether is used  in  the  hospital."   Mr. Bow-
 ditch,  as a scholar and a  historian, must have  had before him the  Comptes
 Rendus of the French Academy, where the whble award of  the committee is
 published.   He gives, however, as the award of the Academy,  but a portion of
 the report, omitting wholly  that  which  relates  to Dr. Jackson's discovery.
 Even the part which he has  given, he  has mistranslated in such a manner as
 to detract from Dr. Jackson's merit.
   In the preface  to his book he says :  "The Academy, it will be seen,  accord to
 Dr. Morton the idea, thought, or purpose of making this discovery,  and to  Dr.
 Jackson the observed fact (le fait observl)  of the  safety of the agent used,
 and attributes the  final result  equally to them both,  regarding  the  mental
 preoccupation  or engrossment of  the one, and the  observations of the other,
 alike indispensable."
   This statement is full of errors.  The Academy does not accord to Morton the
 idea, thought or purpose of making this discovery, namely, the applicability of
 sulphuric ether to prevent the pain of  surgical operations.  It does  not accord
 to Dr. Jackson merely  the observed fact {le fait  observe) of the safety of  the
 agent used.   The report says  expressly that '' the fact observed by Dr. Jack-
 son was, that individuals exposed during a certain  time  to the  action of ethe-
 real vapor, had been momentarily deprived of all  sensibility; this is the phys-
 iological fact.  M. Jackson verified it upon himself."    The fact observed was
 not, as Mr. Bowditch would imply, a mere auxiliary one, but a fact  containing
 within itself the  whole scientific  discovery.  It was the important fact of
 anaesthesia by inhalation.  The manner in which Mr.  Bowditch has distorted
 this award will be seen from the following translation of  an extract from  the
 report upon the prize of Medicine and Surgery for the years 1847 and 1848;
 commissioners, MM. Velpeau,  Rayer, Serres,  Magendie, Dumeril, Andral,
 Flourens,  Lallemand;   Roux, chairman.  (Comptes Rendus de VAcademie
 des Sciences,  1<S.>0.)
  " You know, gentlemen,— for this debate has already resounded in the bosom
 of the Academy,— that two men, who inhabit   the  same city,  Boston, have
 attached their names by two different titles to this important fact of anaesthesia
 by the inhalation of ethereal vapors, and the application of this means  to medi-
 cal  and  surgical  practice.  One  is M. Jackson, professor of  chemistry,  the
 other, M.  Morton, surgeon  dentist.  Thus, as happens  only  too often under
 similar circumstances, a discussion of  priority has been  raised between them.
 Nevertheless,  the commission is bound to take a part with reference to the facts
 and events which have occurred at a distance from us.   All the documents
 have passed under our eyes; we  have made  a most attentive and conscientious
 examination of them, and  from this  examination we have arrived at  the con-
 viction  that there are in this discovery of etherization two distinct things which

 of Franklin's great  discovery, is essential to render valid Dr. Jackson's claims to the dis-
 covery of etherization ; and the denial by rtiem of those claims rests on a dogma rejected by
 the whole scientific world, and expressly repudiated by Whewell in the words already quoted :
 "1 do  not concede  that experiments  of verification, devised and  committed to another for
 performance, give the operator a right to claim the discovery as his  own."
 The majority of the committee concede the truth of this  principle, and endeavor to evade its
application to the ether controversy, not by disproving the facts admitted by the aforesaid gen-
tlemen, but  by arguing that those facts are " improbable," notwithstanding  they are estab-
lished both  by the admissions of Dr. Jackson's principal  opponents, and by irrefragable evi-
dence. 
48
were produced  successively;  one of which belongs to M. Jackson, the other to
M. Morton.   M. Jackson had remarked that some individuals, on account of
having remained during a certain time exposed  to. the action of ethereal vapors,
had been, for the time, deprived of all sensibility.  This is the  physiological
fact.   M. Jackson  verified it  upon  himself.   Later, M.   Morton succeeded
several times in performing, without pain, the extraction of teeth from certain
persons who had  been  previously  submitted  to the  inhalation of ethereal
vapor.   Moreover, he  prevailed upon certain  surgeons of the large hospitals
of Boston to have recourse to the same means in the practice of large  opera-
tions.  Here is anaesthesia  rendered useful,  applied.   The discovery thus
received its complement.   MM. Jackson and Morton "were necessary one to the
other.   Without the importunity, the devotion to one idea,  the courage, not to
say audacity, of M. Morton,  the observation made by M Jackson might  have
remained a long time unapplied;  and without the fact observed by M. Jackson,
the idea of M.  Morton might have been sterile and without  effect.
  "After, then, having maturely reflected,  the commission has  thought that
there were two distinct parts to be  recognized in this  brilliant discovery of
etherization, and that to each of the  two, separately, ought to be  accorded  a
particular prize.   In consequence, it  proposes to the Academy, to decree  a
prize of two thousand five hundred francs  to M. Jackson,  for his observations
and his experiments upon the anaesthetic effects produced by the inhalation of
ether.  Another, of two thousand five hundred  francs, likewise, to M. Mortonj
for having introduced this method into surgical practice  after the indications of
M. Jackson."
  Now, what was this idea (pensee) of Mr. Morton, which Mr. Bowditch, purely
on his own authority, says, was  the purpose of making this discovery ?  Mr.
Bowditch might have seen, in  the same number  of the Comptes Rendus in
which  the report of  the  commission  is contained, a published  lecture  upon
etherization, by M. Yelpeau, who is  named at the head of  the commission on-
ether.   This lecture explains that this idea  (pensee) of Morton,  was a  notion,
not peculiar to himself, but common  to men of his  profession, that some way
could be contrived for extracting  teeth without pain: an idea which the mesmer-
izers have pretended they have realized;  an idea which, Dr. Warren says, has
long prevailed in the medical profession,  and which the  majority report  says,
has obtained since the most remote antiquity.
  M. Velpeau says:  " It was reserved for the new world,  and for the city of
Boston, to give to that which all  thought  impossible, the  force of an  accom;-
plished fact.  Two men were, in some sort, associated for the demonstration of
the  fact.   The one, M.  Jackson,  a chemist,  a distinguished savant,  having
seen some students intoxicate themselves with  ether, and become insensible in
the laboratories of Cambridge, respired himself the vapor of ether, in order to
cure himself of headache, or to  calm the irritations of his  chest,  which he had
contracted by breathing chlorine.   His experiments  and  remarks led  him to
conclude that the vapor of ether could render man insensible to the action of
exterior agents.  The other,  M. Morton, a  simple dentist, tormented for some
time with need of realizing the famous axiom of the men of his profession, the
extracting teeth without pain, spoke of this to Dr. Jackson, whose student he
had  been.   ' Make your patients breathe ether,'  says the  chemist;  ' they
will  fall asleep, and you can do with them,  afterwards,   what you  please.'
With this gleam of light, Mr. Morton puts himself at work, contrives  or con-
structs apparatus,  makes trials,  and soon succeeds in extracting,  without  pain,
the teeth of those  who came to invoke the skill of his  hand.   Sure then of 
49
his fact, he addressed himself to the surgeons of the  Massachusetts Hospital,
and proposed to them to apply his means to patients who were to be submitted
to the action of cutting instruments.   They hesitate a moment;  they after-
wards  accept.   Without being  complete, the  first experiment  gave courage.
At  the second  attempt, success left nothing  to desire.   The  facts multiply
themselves in a few days, and the question is answered almost as soon as put.
No objection is longer possible, the most incredulous are obliged  to yield to
the evidence ; they must believe their eyes ;  the solution of the  grand problem
is at last found." *
  The remarks of M. Velpeau, although according too large a  share of merit
to Morton, leave no doubt, that, in the  opinion of the commission, Morton was
wholly indebted to Dr. Jackson for  the  idea that the  application of the vapor
of ether could render man insensible to  the action of exterior agents.
   Taking the report of the commission, and its explanation as given by M.
Velpeau, there  can be no  doubt, that  Mr. Bowditch has ignorantly or wil-
fully misrepresented the opinions and judgment of the commission.
   The undersigned appeals to all honorable scholars, whether any authority is
to be given to the opinions or statements of one, who,  disclaiming all bias, and
speaking ex cathedra as an impartial historian, has been so careless or ignorant
as to  publish,  as the whole award  of  the  French Academy, only an  extract
from the report of the commission, wholly omitting that portion which recognizes
Dr.  Jackson's discovery; who has been so reckless as to give his  surmises as
the solemn judgments of the  Academy ; and who has wilfully  misrepresented
that the award of the Academy accords  to Dr. Jackson only the observation of
the safety of the anaesthetic agent, and  to Mr. Morton, the purpose of making
the discovery of anaesthesia by inhalation ;  who, having in his  report, claimed
for Mr. Morton, the honor of the discovery, partly on the ground of his previous
experiments  with ether, calls the award — which rejects all Morton's claims to
previous experiments, and declares that he applied ether in  conformity with the
" indications" the pointing out of Dr. Jackson — an entire triumph of Dr.
Morton over the exclusive claims of his opponent!
   The undersigned fully agrees with the majority, that this question of dis-
covery is one in every way  proper to be tried by a, jury of the vicinage.   It
has been tried  by such a jury, and here is their triumphant verdict:

" To the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress assembled:
   " The undersigned, residents of  Boston and its vicinity, respectfully repre-
sent, that they have  been familiar with the great discovery of  the anaesthetic
use of ether  from its origin, and with the controversy following it.   They now
believe, and  ever have  believed, that Dr. Charles T. Jackson  is its sole and
veritable discoverer;  and that any merit on the part of W. T.  G. Morton, the
surgeons of the Massachusetts General Hospital, or of others, consists-in taking
his discovery, after he had communicated it to many persons, in many places,
known to some of us to be of unimpeached  and unimpeachable  characters, and
subjecting it to additional employment.   We, therefore, strongly feel that any
recognition of  the  comparatively insignificant connection of others in bringing
this °great discovery into general use,  on the  part of your honorable bodies,
without granting a proportionate award to its originator and discoverer, would
work a wrong  and injustice beyond parallel  in the history of science.

  * It should be observed that M. Velpeau was in correspondence with  some of the surgeons of
the Massachusetts General Hospital. 
oO
   " \\ e. therefore, feel bound, earnestly and respectfully, to remonstrate against
 the distribution of any national honors or rewards to any other person, which
 we believe to be due solely (so far as the great fact of discovery is considered)
 to Dr. Jackson ; for we feel an assurance, as  strong as  evidence deiived from
 the testimony of others and our  specific knowledge of Dr. Jackson's traits o['
 character can give,  that,  had it not been for him, this great  contribution to
 humanity would be still among the things yet hidden.
   '• And as in duty bound will ever pray.
   "February 9th, 1852.

 Luther Y. Bell. Physician and Superintendent of the  McLean Asylum
       for the Insane.
 C.  H. S ted man, M. D., Late Physician to the City Institutions, South
       Boston.
 Edward  Reynolds, M. D., Physician and Surgeon to the Eye and Ear In-
       firmary, and late Surgeon to Massachusetts General Jlospital.
 J. B.  S. Jackson, M.  D., one  of the Physicians of the  Massachusetts
       General Hospital.
 Silas Durkee, M.  D.                 D.  M. Parker, M.
 Ephraim Buck. M. D.
 Woodbridge Strong, M. D.
 William  J. Walker, M.  D.
 Samuel Morrill, M. D.
 Horace  Dupee, M. D., one  of  the
   Physicians  of  the   Lying-in
   Hospital.
 Henry Bartlett, M. D.
 Franklin F. Patch, M. D.
 E. J. Davenport,  M. D.
 Henry A. Ward. M. D.
 John Flint, M. D.
 Josiah F. Flagg, M. D.
 Wm. P.  Dexter. M.  D.
 W. S.  Coffin, M. D.
 E. Whitney  Blake, M. D.
 J. M. Phipps, M.  D.
 George F. Bigelow, M. D.
 Joshua Tucker, M. D.
 Henry A. Martin, M. D.
 Charles M. Windship, M.  D.
 Joseph H. Streeter, M. D.
 Horatio G. Morse, M. D.
 J. W. Warren, Jr., M. D.
 John B.  Alley,  M. D.
 J. L. Williams,  M. D.
 Geo. W.  Otis, Jr., M. D.
 George Russell, M. D.
 P. E. Molloy, M.  D.
James Hyndman, M. D.
Harvey E. Weston, M. D.
Abram Paige, M. D.
Daniel  Harwood, M.  D.
                  D.
 E. T. Eastman, M. D.
 S. S. Whipple, M. D.
 E. C. Rolfe, M. D.
 C. A. Walker, M.  D,  Physician to
   the City Institutions.
 Wm. II. Thorndike, M. D.
 Robert Green, M.  D.
 F. L. Chase,  M. D.
 J. B. Taylor, M. D.
 Jona. W. Bemis, M. D.
 Jacob Hayes, M. D.
 Luther Johnson, M. D.
 J. F. W. Lane, M. D.
 Wm. W. Morland,  M. D.
 John Bacon, Jr., M. D.
 F. S. Ainsworth, M. D.
 Nath. B. Shurtleff, M. D.
 Buckminster Brown, M.  D.
 J. V. C. Smith, M. D., late  City
  Physician.
 W. G. Hanaford, M. D.
 E. Palmer, Jr., M. D.
 James Ayer, M. D.
 Ira W. Tobie, M. D.
 Fytche Edward Oliver, M. D.
 Le Baron Russell,  M. D.
 A. A. Watson,  M.  D.
 Geo.  H. Gay, M. D.
Geo.  Stephens Jones, M.  D.
John. A. Tarbell, M. D.
R. W. Newell, M.  D.
T. Fletcher Oakes, M. D.
Henry W. Williams, M.  D. 
51
John Odin. Jr., M. D.               Thomas B. Wales,  M. D.
Charles W. Calkins, M. D.           Geo. Hubbard, M.  D.
Howard Sargent,, M.  D.             G. C. Holbrook,  M. D.
Horace Stacy, M. D.                 J. E. Herrick, M.  D.
S. Cabot, Jr., M.  D.                 Alanson Abbe, M.  D.
Robert Capen, M. D.                 W. W. Codman,  M. D.
Benjamin S. Codman, M. D.          John C. Hayden, M. D.
S. A. Bemis,  Dentist.               William F. Channing, M. D.
John Clough, M. D.                  M. C. Green, M. D.
S. L. Abbott, M. D.                  E. D. G. Palmer, M. D.
D. Humphrey Storer,  M. D., one of  D. M. B. Thaxter, M. D.
  the physicians Mass. Gen. Hos-   Jno.  S. H. Fogg, M. D.
  pital.                             P. M. Crane, M. D.
J. Sydenham Flint, M. D.            Jas. J. Fales, M. D.
Henry S. Lee, M.  D.                 Dan'l V. Folts, M. D.
Calvin  Stevens, M. D.               Chas. J. Putnam, M. D.
David Osgood. M. D.                 Moses Clark, M.  D.
Elisha  G. Tucker. M.  D.             Abraham R, Thompson, M. D.
Moses W. Weld, M. D.               Stephen Ball, M. D.
Henry James Martin,  M. D.          A. D. W. Martin, M. D.

" To the Senate and House of Representatives in  Congress assembled:
   "The undersigned,  members of the Massachusetts Medical Society, resident
in Boston and  its  vicinity,  respectfully represent, that  they are  familiar with
the principal facts connected with the  great discovery of etherization, and its
introduction into surgical practice;  and they declare their full belief  that Dr.
Charles T.  Jackson,  of Boston, having inferred, from  his  experiments and
observations, that  sulphuric ether, free from alcohol and acids, has the power
safely and effectually to destroy  the pain of  surgical operations, communicated
that conclusion to  various  individuals, and  in February,  1846, recommended
to one of thern, Joseph Peabody, a student in  his  laboratory, the use of sul-
phuric  ether as an anaesthetic agent;  and  subsequently, on the 30th of  Sep-
tember of the same year, to  W. T. G. Morton, a dentist of Boston, giving him.,
at the same time, directions respecting the quality of  the  ether  to be  used
and the proper mode of administering  it, and assuring him of the safety, and
assuming the responsibility, of  the application.
   " The undersigned  further declare their  belief that  the merit, which  they
would by no means undervalue,  of W.  T. G. Morton and others,  in relation to
the discovery of etherization, consists entirely in their having  practically ver-
ified it. and zealously labored to introduce it into surgical practice.
   •• The undersigned believing, therefore, that in relation to the great discovery
of etherization Dr. Jackson was the  head, and W. T.  G. Morton the hand,
respectfully and earnestly remonstrate against any grant, by your honorable
bodies, of honors  or money to  the  latter, not accompanied  by the grant of a
proportionate reward to  the former, for the far higher  agency he had in con-
ferring the great boon of etherization upon  the human race.

Morrill Wyman, M. D.               Charles Chase, M. D.
Benjamin D. Bartlett, M. D.         A. B. Snow  M. D.
J. E.  Stevens, M  D.                 Herman B.  Inches M^D.
George  Baker, M. 1>.                C. D. ^eland  .M  D.
Wm G. Wheeler.  M. D.             S. R. Philbnck, M.  D. 
52
Joseph C. Sanborne, M. D.
Henry Lyon, M. D.
Edwin Adams, M. D.
E. W. Gleason, M. D.
Jno. C. Dalton, M. D.
Henry A. Barrett, M. D.
Josiah Bartlett, M. D.
J. S.  Calef, M. D.
Andrew Alexander, M. D.
Jonathan Ware, M. D.
James A. Merrill,  M. D.
Charles F. Hoffendahl, M. D.
T. J.  Parker, M.  D.
Anson Hooker, M. D.
Benjamin Seabury, M. D.
A. L. Weymouth,  M. D.
Alexander Poole,  M. D.
William Ingalls, M.  D..  Physician
  and Surgeon I. S. Marine Hos-
  pital, Chelsea.  Mass.
B. P. F. Randall,'  M. D.
G.  C. Shattuck, Jr., one  of  the
  Physicians  of the  Massachu-
  setts General Hospital.
Henry G.  Clark, M. I).,  one of the
  Surgeons of the  Massachusetts
   General  Hospital.
E. A. S. Nichols, M. D.
J. S.  Nichols, M. D.
Timothy R.  Nute,  M. D.
H. D. Train, M. D.
Charles F. Foster,  M. D.
A. B. Malcolm, M. D."
  As a suitable accompaniment  to  the  preceding  remonstrances, the under-
signed presents the  following letter, addressed to him by Dr. Luther  Y. Bell,
Superintendent of the McLean Asylum for the Insane,— a  gentleman who,
by the concurrent testimony of the delegation in  Congress from his  State, is
second in medical attainments and personal character to none in his profession.

                            "McLean Asylum for the Insane,   )
                                Somerville, Mass., March 26th, 1852. \
  " Sir,—Your letter of March 1st has  this moment reached me from  the Post
Office, after a  delay entirely unaccountable to me.  I did write a letter to
Col. Wm. H. Bissell, M. C, Chairman, &c, in reply  to a printed  circular,
addressed to me by  him, requesting  any information within my knowledge  or
experience in relation to the anaesthetic agents.
  "I  replied to  him  by mail, but kept no copy of my letter.   Its  contents
are, however, distinct in my memory, certainly as to its general tenor.  »
  " I said to him that I had no views or experience on  the subject which were
not common to the profession.
  " I then observed that, although no opinion was solicited on the question of
discovery, I could not, with my views of duty,  forbear taking advantage of the
present opportunity to  express  the  entire  conviction  which  I,  familiar with
the whole matter from  its  earliest  announcement, had always  had  that the
credit  of the  discovery is  due entirely to  Dr. Jackson,  and that  the part
which  Mr. Morton, Dr. Hay ward,  Dr.  Bigelow,  junior, and the rest of the
early experimenters played, consisted solely in pursuing the course which  he
had marked out and tested.   I further stated, that if it had not been  for Dr.
Jackson, this great discovery, in my opinion, would be  among the things that
are yet unheard of.   I also stated, that one of  the great  stumbling-blocks in
the minds of those  who know nothing of the peculiar mental  constitution  of
certain men of ingenuity and science,— the circumstance  that Dr. J., if con-
scious of such a mighty discovery, did not at once make a great bruit  about it,
— was perfectly explained in the minds of all of us, who intimately knew him
and his modes of thinking and acting; we feel  that  what he  did was pre-
cisely what  a priori we should  have expected  him to do.  Indeed,  I have
often spoken of his course, in the early days of this discovery, as exactly anulo- 

gous to his course of action in relation to certain valuable discoveries of his, in
his geological surveys of Maine and New Hampshire.  I concluded by saying
that  opinions,— I might  have said, if based on a vast  number of little  and
almost incommunicable circumstances,— are of value  only as connected with
the sources  from which they are derived; and I referred him as to the value
of any judgment originating from me, to the Massachusetts delegation in your
House, or to our Senators, as well as to those from New Hampshire, to most of
whom  my position in the profession and the community is not unknown.
                         " I have the honor to be,
                                     " Very respectfully yours,
                                                " LUTHER V. BELL.

   "P. S. — So far as the personal character of the  claimants for the honor
of this discovery, may bear on  the probabilities of their  claims, I think I
ouo-ht  to add my testimony to the,  doubtless, concurrent mass of opinion from
this  region,  that if there  be a pure, upright, transparent man among us, it is
Charles T. Jackson.   He is not without his peculiarities of manner and eccen-
tricities of  views,  but for sterling  truthfulness and integrity of character, no
man, on my list of acquaintances, stands higher.
          J                                               " L. V.  B."

   Such are the testimonials  from the " vicinage" in relation to Dr. Jackson's
rights to this  discovery.  No less  decided  and united  is public opinion in
Europe in  his favor.   It is well known that Dr. Jackson received, in honor
of this discovery, from Louis Napoleon,  President of the French Republic, the
cross of the Legion of Honor; and a gold medal, struck expressly for this pur-
pose, from  the  King  of  Sweden,   at  the suggestion  of  Berzelms, the  first
chemist of the world.  These honors, it has been falsely said, were paid to Dr.
Jackson before  Morton's claims were known.   In April, 1850,  Sir  Charles
Lyell, President of the Geological Society of London; writes Dr. Jackson as
follows :

   " Mv dear Sir  — Since you were so  kind as to send me  your pamphlet
provino- your claims to the  ether discovery, I have been much occupied  with
family°affairs, having lost both my father and mother, who died at  an advanced

^' I wasVaCvery glad  to have so clear and unequivocal evidence to show
 to others of your claims of priority, for I and some of  my friends  had  in their
 correspondence with the  United States, had such  distinct statements  to the
 contrary effect, that, although I suspended my own judgment, and  did not take
 Tny pa7t or offer any opinion, I was surprised to see how very unfounded were

 th''"The Pd?scoverynSleading, as it  did,  to  chloroform (which  I believe  many
 of your^Ss regard'as a doubtful impj™^ ™y ^—0,

 I/egar/as ^£$2^™^* l^m^^o^
 of FOgress and  £*™<^ t0 which Americans  have made  use of  this
 ^ffi.^^"^  beyond the people of this country, where
 method of allevi^ntiu            . Rabbinicai notions have most seriously
 prejudice, anVl-gnmoS5t particularly  in London,  where the  medical men

 have  displayed a wan^            ^ gincerel       ,g)
                        *e         '            ''CHARLES  LYELL." 
                                     54

  The undersigned has before him a work on anaesthesia,  published at Yienna.
in 1850. bv Dr. Joseph Weiger, Imperial and Royal principal Dentist to  the
poor.  Emeritus Professor of Surgery, Surgeon to the Courts of Justice, and to
the  Prisons of Yienna.   The author has performed himself 21,000 operations
with ether.   He did 1560 in  the first five  and a half months after  the dis-
covery was made known in  Europe by Dr. Jackson.  In the first fifty days
he operated with ether 547 times.   His cases  are of all kinds, from dental  ex-
tractions to capital  operations and child-birth.    This work has been published
since  the award of the French Academy; and  the author attributes the discov-
ery exclusively to  Dr. Jackson, though  he is  perfectly cognizant of Morton's
pretensions and of his alleged services.
  The author begins thus :  — " Through Jackson's wonderful discovery of the
remarkable effects  of ether vapor upon the human organism, a new era in oper-
ative  surgery has indisputably set  in.   For  centuries there Avas a  fruitless
endeavor, among surgeons of humane feelings, to discover some means of making
the  pain in necessarily  bloody operations less painful, but without success  in
doing it."
  " The accidental  breaking of a flask of ether (chlorine gas)  in a chemical
laboratory of  the New  World, procured for  Dr. Jackson the  fortune of being
made famous by the discovery of the hitherto unknown powers of ether."
  "For centuries  sulphuric ether  was known and was applied  by physicians
in various  diseases, as  well internally as  externally, without  exciting a sus-
picion of its newly-discovered,  as well as its highly beneficial effects."
  Again he speaks of it " as  the  highly important and greatest discovery of
our century.  I say the greatest discovery, since we could realize  our wishes,
though  more  slowly, without  steamboats or telegraphs ;   but what has been
gained to suffering  humanity  by painless operations, he only can comprehend
and appreciate, who is placed on his mournful bed for the purpose  of undergoing
a capital operation."
  In  Vienna the operation of etherization is called " Jacksonizixu ; "  " that is
a new expression.    People  say Galvanizing, after the discovery  of the physi-
cian Galvani ;  so should this discovery be called Jacksonizing, after the gigantic
discovery of Jackson."
  " The people will give it this name, which is probably the only thanks he
will receive for so  beneficent a discovery."   Again, Dr. Weiger says :  " If the
famous  man (Dr.  C. T. Jackson) comes to Yienna, there  is a feast-banquet
in store for him.   Then must all those come  together whose teeth have been
extracted without  pain, and many a tear of thanks will fall upon his hand from
others who  have  been  operated upon, which  will  make  for  him  a chain of
pearls, with which the whole world  is linked to him  as its great  benefactor."*
  Mr. Morton has produced an impression  in his favor, by  the exhibition of
an enormous gold medal, said to have been lately awarded  to him by the French
Academy, which  has been shown  as a final and  special  expression of  the
Academy, as to his  claims  to this  discovery, f   The effect  produced by  the

  *In  consulting twenty-six works, which have been published,  by physicians and surgeons in
different countries of Europe, between the years 1847 and 1852, it is found that not one of them
accords to Mr. Morton any right to the discovery of anaesthesia ; but, on  the contrary, after
examining the claims of the different aspirants to the honor of this discovery, they with great
unanimity accord it to Dr. Charles T. Jackson.  This is the result to which all men of science
have arrived, where the evidence in the case has been impartially weighed.
  t That the Institute of France did not regard Mr. Morton as the discoverer, but only as a
propagator of the discovery, appears from the following extract translated from the Compiei
Rendus of the Institute for May and June, 1H52.  " M. Jackson, who, in the public sess;or. X'-.v. 
55
exhibition of this medal, is displayed in two letters published in the report of
the majority, one from the chief of  the  Bureau of  Medicine and Surgery, and
the other from the surgeon-general of the  United States Army.  The former
says, addressing Mr. Morton:  "The medal of the  first  class, awarded to you
by the Medieal Institute of Paris, evinces  the high estimation, entertained  in
that centre of medical science and intelligence, of the services you have rendered
to humanity."   The latter says: "Permit  me  to congratulate you upon the
flattering testimonial you have received from the National Institute of France."
The committee, in their report, speaking of this medal, say :  " Dr. Morton has,
within a few davs, received the expression  of the Academy in the more accept-
able  form of  their  largest  gold medal."   They then  proceed to describe  it,
distinctly conveying the impression that the award of  this  medal was a new
and signal testimonial in Mr.  Morton's favor.   The undersigned does not deny
that Mr. Morton did receive a medal  from  the Academy.  That which  he, in
fact  received, was of the ordinary  size, about that of  a dollar.  Mr. Morton
has caused the genuine medal to be  surrounded by a gold frame, upon which
is engraved a wreath of oak-leaves, the whole so ingeniously and artfully con-
trived as to give the medal,  with its setting, the appearance of an   enormous
 medal, over four inches in diameter, in a single piece, of the value of four or
 five hundred dollars.   Within a few days,  the undersigned  has  seen in circula-
 tion, a printed book, purporting to be the report of the  majority, circulated, of
 course,  without  the knowledge  or sanction of the  majority, as no  report  had
 been presented by them to  Congress.   In  this book are two engravings, pur-
 porting  to  be fac-similes of the medal.   The deception before referred to, is
 perpetuated and circulated in the engraving; for the setting is there represented
 as an integral portion of the medal,  its diameter, as there delineated, being over
 four inches.   Comment upon  these facts is wholly unnecessary.
    But what does this reception, by  Dr. Morton, of " the largest gold niedar
 of the Academy signify 1  The value of this '' new testimonial of the Academy "
 is shown by the following letter addressed  to Dr. Jackson :


                                [translation.]
                                                  " Paris, 17th May, 1852.
    " My dear Sir, — I have received the  two letters which you have done me
 the honor to write to me the  30th of March and the 7th of April.
    " I wrote to you long since  my personal opinion respecting the prize awarded
 to Mr.  Morton.   In point of fact, the Academy of Sciences decreed  one of
 the Montyon  prizes of 2500 francs to you for  the discovery of etherization,

 4th of March, 1850, had obtained of the  Academy a prize for his researches concerning  the
 effects produced by the inhalation  of ether, asks  if M. Morton, —mho, in that session, had
 also  obtained a prize for his labors on the application of the same therapeutic  agent,-  has
 been considered as inventor, or simply as propagator, of the discovery.
    " The  prods-verbal of the public  session does not permit any doubt in that respect.  I he
 Academy, on the  proposition of the commission on prizes of medicine and of, ?^rgery-fta-the
 years 1847 and l^sf has decreed  a prize of 2500 francs to M Ja ckson, for-his  ob«a™faons
 and his experiments on the anesthetic effects produced by the inhalation of ether   and another
 of 2500  francs likewise to M. Morton, for having introduced that method in surgical practce,
 in conformity with the indications of M. Jackson (d'apresles indications de M. ^fc«,«).
 Comptes Rendus des Stances de VAcademie des Science*, Tome xxxiv  ^"JJ (J' ^^>'
   In the Com pies Rendus for June 14th,  there is a notice of a second tetter which t ^ Ac^my
 received from Dr.  Jackson before their reply to his first had reached him  In the  1 ^Udes
 E^m" for that number of  the proceedings, Mr. Morton is mentioned  as « arrogating to
 himself" the discovery of etherization. 
56
and it has decreed a prize of 2500  francs to Mr. Morton for the application
of this discovery to surgical operations.
   '• Now, all persons who receive a prize of the Academy of Sciences, can draw  •
simply the  sum which has  been voted them, or  they can draw a medal either
of bronze,  silver,  or gold.   This medal  bears  a head  of  Minerva, and the
superscription of Institute of France.   The cost of  the  medal  is deducted
from  the sum  paid.  You  have drawn  simply the sum of 2500 francs, as  is
usual; but, according to the information  I have obtained from the Secretary,
to-day, Mr. Morton asked for a Gold Medal, the value of which is oOO francs
(*60), and  he has received in money only about 2200  francs.   In that Mr.
Morton has  but made use  of a right which  could not be contested ;  but the
medal which he has obtained is the ordinary one  of the Institute.
   " It was not struck expressly for him.   You hare the right to ask for one
exactly like  it; only, in that case, you should receive but 2200 francs, instead
of 2500 francs.
               " Y^our  devoted servant and friend,
                    "(Signed),          L. ELIE  DE BEAUMONT."

   The  undersigned feels  it due  to  the claims of Mr. Wells, to state, that  he
 has  not examined  the evidence before the committee on his  behalf with much
 care.  The  papers were referred to a member of the committee, whose views
 are  probably incorporated  in the report of the  majority.  But if all that Mr.
 Wells's friends urge, is susceptible of being  proved, the undersigned is satisfied
 from the evidence that Dr. Jackson's discovery was made long  before Wells
 claimed that he knew anything of the power of ether in rendering the system
 insensible  to pain under surgical operations.                                .
   In submitting   the  foregoing, the undersigned lays  no  claim to original
 views.   The subject has been exhausted.  It has been argued with much abil-
 ity, and rather more warmth than was becoming by some of its advocates.  He
 has  only tried so to avail  himself of the labors of others, as  to present the
 truth fairly before the House.
   When the undersigned  entered upon  the investigation, he was inclined to
 the opinion  that Mr. Morton was entitled to the credit of the discovery.  The
 undersigned concurs in all that has been said, either by the able and accom-
 plished  Dr. Warren, by the majority of the committee, or by other persons,
 in favor of  the inestimable value of this  great discovery.   Its advantages can
 hardly be exaggerated.  He only desires that the head  that conceived, and the
 science and learning that  pointed the  way, should be rewarded, as well as  the
 hand that,  following  instructions,  was  instrumental in  bringing this agent
 before the world.
    He  read all the arguments which  Mr. Morton, with remarkable  industry,
 pressed upon his attention ; and,  examining them with care, he was satisfied
 that injustice  had been done to Dr. Jackson.  These opinions were formed and
 expressed before   the  undersigned  had ever  seen Dr. Jackson,  or heard any-
 thing in  his  behalf except from  the  able argument of his counsel, John L.
 Hayes,  Esq.,  of  this city,  to whose argument the  undersigned is indebted for
 many suggestions embodied in this report.   The undersigned has never had
 ten  minutes' conversation  with Dr. Jackson, who was in this city during  the
 past spring for a  few days, very properly abstaining from all personal solicita-
 tion of members to  induce  them, by partial  representations,  to  regard his
 claims favorably.
                                                      EDW.  STANLY. 
57
  The undersigned, a member of the select committee upon etherization, who
was appointed in consequence of the death of Mr. Rantoul,
  Reports, That, after considering the  subject,  and reading the evidence upon
the part as well of Dr. Jackson as of Dr. Morton,  he has arrived at the  con-
clusion that Dr. Charles T. Jackson is the original discoverer of the applica-
tion of purified sulphuric ether, by inhalation,  as a means of preventing pain
from surgical operations.
  The undersigned does not desire to detract from any credit  that may  have
been due to Dr. Morton for his action  in applying  the anaesthetic agent, and
in bringing it more prominently before the public.
                                             ALEXANDER EVANS.
8