“The history of these operative failures, though they will never be told, constitute a large part of the merit of those who have worked with Dr. Hemmeter in this research. No matter what the final outcome of the future investigation of this problem will be, whether affirmative or negative, the intrinsic value of such work will be appreciated by all who are to the least degree conversant with the history of physiology. Nowadays we are too liable to forget the hard plodders in experimental work who have started the solution of a problem, and when the last word has been said the worker of the beginning is generally forgotten.
“In this connection I desire to quote an expression of Prof. William H. Welch concerning the merit of the work of ex-Surgeon General Sternberg, done since the first Yellow Fever Commission was appointed, in 1879 (see Medical News. June 21, 1902. p. 1198). Dr. Welch said 'that Sternberg's work with yellow fever would stand forever; that it was a common thing in these busy days to forget the steps which led up to an important discovery. All that Dr. Sternberg had done in the study of yellow fever was necessary work, and it had to be done just in the way that he did it. The ground had first to be cleared. If it were not so, the discovery had not been possible; and later discoverers themselves would have had to hunt out the large host of microorganisms which Dr. Sternberg had described and laid aside.'
“And similarly I can say of Dr. Hemmeter's efforts that, no matter what the eventual outcome of this problem will be, all that he has done was necessary work, and it had to be done just in the way that he did it.
“Just one more idea and I shall have finished. It concerns the demonstration of such research work in places at a distance from the experimentor's laboratory. Such demonstrations are always attended with great difficulty. They usually require four animals, two or three janitors to transport them, and as many laboratory assistants as the director of the laboratory can manage to take with him. The technique of these operations, the high-grade sensitiveness of operated animals, the refinement with which chemical tests should be made, all require for their safe conduct that the experimentor should work only with those men who are used to his system. The animals themselves are always influenced in one way or other by the presence of strangers. I remember in one animal which was demonstrated on March 17th, at the University Hospital, the demonstration at which Dr. Satterthwaite was present, a most unexpected change in the quality of the gastric secretions took place. This was a control animal which had undergone no operation whatever. He was simply taken along to show the proteolytic power of a normal dog and compare it with the operated dogs. His gastric juice had been previously tested on several occasions, and always found to be of regular standard, but on the night of the demonstration before the Medical Society this animal's gastric juice was practically inactive, containing no HCL nor pepsin.