But this State-wide inquiry is only a part of the work. Every year, for a period of at least ten years, the record must be revised, the result of surgical operations recorded, the deaths enumerated, the new cases added. The expense of each annual revision would be far less than that of the original inquiry; but the inquiry will be costly, and should be costly, if it is to be accurate and complete. Here, indeed, would be the opportunity for the co-operation of organizations devoted to "cancer research," and particularly of that new foundation, the income of which for a single year is far more than the original investigation would cost. And when the inquiry is completed; when all attainable information concerning the occurrence of malignant disease shall have been secured not for a single year, but for a period of successive years, not for one community, but for an entire state, and for each of its constitutuent parts, what then? Then I believe a knowledge of the cause of cancer will soon be attained. When we know the cause, then there will be hope for prevention, which is far better than cure. All the various experiments upon mice, for example, whatever they may teach concerning the disease in the lower animals, have not enlightened us concerning the cause of the malady in mankind. The greatest and most promising fields for scientific research, now almost untrodden, awaits the explorers of the future. In a world where now there is comparative unconcern, there may soon be fearful apprehensions of the increasing prevalence of an almost irremediable disease. Within the coming century, the investigation I have here outlined, will sometime be made; and, as a result, the cause of cancer may be as well known to medical science, as the causes of typhoid fever or malaria,--mysteries that seemed insoluble less than a century ago. And I venture with assurance to predict, that some time within the next fifty years, the Governments of England and of the United States, alarmed, it may be, by a continually increasing mortality from cancer, will condemn under severest penalties, the sale for human food of meat deriveed from animals affected by malignant disease,--no matter how great may be the pecuniary loss to every slaughtering establishment and packing-house in either land. The public awakening to danger that must precede legislation cannot yet be discerned; and before the national apprehension is aroused and apathy ceases, probably more than a million lives will be sacrificed to cancer, in England and America alone. ------------------------------ Note.--"The deaths ascribed to cancer or malignant disease in England and Wales during 1912, numbered 37,323. The mortality of males was 913 per million living, as compared with 891 in 1911, and that of females, 1,117, as compared with 1,098. IN THE CASE OF EACH SEX, THESE RATES ARE THE HIGHEST ON RECORD."--From 75th Report of Registrar-General, 1914, p. lxxxiii.