degree of predisposition toward it in the person to be contaminated. I
believe I have Dr. Trousseau's leave to say that the contact of a wounded
or abraded surface with the matter of a leprous sore will convey the
disease; this is, of course, inoculation; and he seemed to think no other
method of contamination probable. I was careful to provide myself with a
pair of gloves when I visited the settlement, to protect myself in case I
should be invited to shake hands; but I noticed that the doctor fearlessly
shook hands with some of the worst cases, even where the fingers were
suppurating and wrapped in rags.

There are several women on the Islands, confirmed lepers, whose husbands
are at home and sound; one, notably, where the husband is a white man. On
the other hand, a woman was pointed out to me who had had three husbands,
each of whom in a short time after marrying her became a leper. There
are children lepers, whose parents are not lepers; and there are parents
lepers, whose children are at home and healthy.

There are three white men on the island, lepers, two of them in a very bad
state. So far as I could learn the particulars of their previous history,
they had lived flagitiously loose lives; such as must have corrupted their
blood long before they became lepers. In some other cases of native lepers
I came upon similar histories; and while I do not believe that every case,
or indeed perhaps a majority of cases, involves such a previous career of
vice, I should say that this is certainly a strongly predisposing cause.

As to the danger of infection to a foreign visitor, there is absolutely
none, unless he should undertake to live in native fashion among the
natives, smoking out of their pipes, sleeping under their tapas, and
eating their food with them; and even in such an extreme case his risk
would be very slight now, so thoroughly has the disease been "stamped out"