Genre:

Reportage

Subjects:

Societies, Sanitation, Health, Gender, Medical Treatment, Vaccination, Disease

    Discusses the 'awakening season' of the 'serious world' at a time when the 'sporting world' starts its activities. Notes the activities of the Ladies' Sanitary Association, whose object is 'to extend and popularise the knowledge of the laws of health by means of libraries, lectures, tracts, clothing and coal clubs, and other similar agencies'. Stresses that members of the organisation do not 'scorn the assistance of the sterner sex', pointing out that among those present at a recent meeting were Edwin Chadwick, William Farr, and Robert Druitt, the author of a treatise on light wines (a reference to Druitt 1865). Describes the publishing, philanthropic, and other activities of the association, including the disclosure by its president, Josephine E Butler, of a 'goodly series of bona fide transactions', and the printing of five hundred copies of 'essays on small-pox and vaccination'.