III.--A great part of the population consists of strangers, not only because most of our servants and labourers are natives of other countries, but because Geneva being a frontier city, girt about by Savoy, Switzerland, and France, and situated on the highways of intercourse between these states, travellers are always coming and going. IV.--Notwithstanding this continual resort of strangers within our walls, an epidemic of smallpox is of almost regular occurrence every five years; and between the epidemics it frequently happens that we have no natural smallpox whatever, either in the city or its vicinity. V.--Inoculation began to be practised here in 1751, since which date we have inoculated a very large number of children annually, and with such marked success that the deaths have but slightly exceeded 1 in 300. Although we have often had to inoculate with pus brought from a distance at times when there was no smallpox to be found in the city, and although children so inoculated have gone freely into the streets, walks, and other public places, before, during, and after the eruption, we have never observed that they were sources of contagion, nor that they produced any intermediate epidemic, nor that they accelerated the return of the periodical epidemic. VI.--Lastly, our citizens enjoy a republican constitution which requires us to pay most scrupulous regard to the liberty of every individual. No coercive measures to hinder the introduction or communication of smallpox are here practicable; and we believe we ought to limit our action to advice, and to simple precautions of police, which must not, nor even seem to be, oppressive to the citizens. This glimpse into old Geneva is not only instructive as concerns inoculation, but it is another exposure of the monstrous fable that represents European cities as decimated with smallpox until Jenner’s advent as saviour--a fable that vanishes like smoke whenever brought into contact with matter-of-fact. Inoculation was introduced to Rome and Florence during a severe epidemic in 1754; and attention being drawn to the remedy, it was discovered that the Italian peasantry had long practised voluntary smallpox just as did the peasantry of Wales and the Highlands of Scotland. In Spain, inoculation made little headway: in the words of Moore-- Some inoculations were effected in a few trading cities, which held communication with England; but these efforts were of short duration, and from the distinguished inaction of the Spaniards, inoculation was soon relinquished; and no other country in Europe has suffered so little from smallpox.[66]