Sinclair, Sir William J.: Semmelweis. His Life and his Doctrine (Manchester, 1909)
VIII. Forerunners and Contemporaries
FRANCE 321 science a Galileo, in biology a Servetus, and in politics a legion of martyrs have been sacrificed to their faith in the battle-field or on the scaffold in all ages. In the history of obstetrics there has been only one Semmelweis, and he did not appear till the middle of the 19th century : it ill becomes the fellow countrymen, who crucified him before accepting his doctrine, to sneer at the minor defects in the medical science of a people who in essentials had left them far behind generations before. The forerunners of Semmelweis were almost entirely to be found in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The fact is too obvious to require discussion, but the causes are of great interest, and might be readily traced if space permitted. To state them in the most concise manner is a very difficult task. The first of the important causes of the pre-eminence of British obstetricians was the early and successful assertion of the claim to practice midwifery by medical practitioners, as against the traditional usage and the strident demands of women for the perpetuation of the exclusive privilege of attending women in labour. France. In France the domination of the sages femmes was the first to be established and the last to be displaced. Most British medical readers, who as students have been made familiar by professors’ quotations with the names of Mauriceau, Palfyn, Levret, Baudelocque, Dubois and many others up to the present generation, have taken the impression that these French obstetricians were distinguished men whose endowments and experience had placed them in the position of consultant specialists, and occasional advisers of many obstetric medical practitioners in their more formidable difficulties. As a matter of fact such men only came to the aid of the sages femmes when called in, and the most important of them were not even permitted to cross the threshold of the old Hőtel-Dieu or the modern Maternité except when sent for by the personage who occupied the position of head-midwife. v
