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396 ILLUSTRATED WORLD
that were. If infection spread from the
original wound in a limb, by the time the
patient reached a base hospital, the limb
had to be taken off at a considerable distance
above the wound. If the infection
spread from a wound in the trunk or
head, so that cure by amputation was
manifestly impossible, the patient was
moved forthwith to the ward for hopeless
cases, and no more time was wasted on
him. The chances for spreading may be
guessed when one considers that practically
no patient reaches any place
where careful surgical attention may be
given him for at least thirty-six hours
after receiving his injury, and that the
usual period is from forty-eight to seventy-two
hours. This was the deadly
disease which Doctor Carrel set himself
to conquer.
When the war broke out, Dr. Carrel
left his work at the Rockefeller Institute
and placed himself at the disposal of his
native country, France. Luckily for the
world, the French have a sense of values,
and did not lose that sense even in the
turmoil and chaos produced
by the onrush of the German
war machine; so they
did not attempt to waste
Dr. Carrel's genius by
using him as a military surgeon.
Instead, they gave
him a free hand to do whatever
he desired toward improving
the science of military
surgery.
The most omniscient
Fate could not have devised
a better opportunity for
snatching good out of evil.
Dr. Carrel had been astounding
the medical world
for years with his work of
transplanting living tissue
from one animal to another
—not mere skin grafting,
and the like, but transplanting
entire organs, legs, and
eyes.
And here was more human
material with which
to work than he had guinea pigs before
—and human material on which it was a
mercy to work, for according to the best
existing practice the men were doomed
anyway, and anything he might do could
not injure them.
Backed by the Rockefeller funds, he
set up a hospital at Neuilly, near Paris,
and commenced work. He started with
the assumption that the best way to attack
the infection was to keep washing
out every nook and cranny of the wound,
just as the customary practice was to
air every portion of it constantly. In
order to do this, he had to conquer two
difficulties. One was the fact that no
common antiseptic could be used; the
other was the lack of a suitable method
for getting the antiseptic infused
throughout the wound, and sustaining a
fresh supply of it. The first problem he
assigned to the English chemist, Henry
D. Dakin, who now hails from New
York. The second he appropriated for
himself.
Dakin perhaps had the harder job.
Dr. Alexis Carrel at
Work in the Laboratory
of His Hospital at
Neuilly, France