Читать книгу A Half Century Among the Siamese and the Lāo: An Autobiography онлайн

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I returned to the palace of the son-in-law, and very carefully vaccinated the young prince on whom so many hopes were centred. I watched the case daily, and my best hopes seemed realized. The pustules developed finely. All the characteristic symptoms appeared and disappeared at the proper times. But when the scab was about to fall off, the little prince was taken with diarrhœa. I felt sure that a little paregoric or some other simple remedy would speedily set the child right, and I offered to treat the case. But half a dozen doctors—most of them “spirit-doctors”—were already in attendance. The poor child, I verily believe, was dosed to death. So evident was it that the unfortunate outcome could not have been the result of vaccination, that both the parents again and again assured me that they entertained no such thought. But all diseases—as was then universally believed among the Lāo—are the result of incurring the displeasure of the “spirits” of the family or of the clan. The “spirits” might have taken umbrage at the invasion of their prerogative by vaccination.