Please notice that the
temperature of the water never rises above fifty degrees, and that
seventy-seven are necessary for the cultivation of germs.* Besides,
scarcely any contagious diseases come to Lourdes, neither cholera, nor
typhus, nor variola, nor measles, nor scarlatina. We only see certain
organic affections here, paralysis, scrofula, tumours, ulcers and
abscesses, cancers and phthisis; and the latter cannot be transmitted by
the water of the baths. The old sores which are bathed have nothing to
fear, and offer no risk of contagion. I can assure you that on this point
there is even no necessity for the Blessed Virgin to intervene."
* The above are Fahrenheit degrees.--Trans.
"Then, in that case, doctor," rejoined Pierre, "when you were practising,
you would have dipped all your patients in icy water--women at no matter
what season, rheumatic patients, people suffering from diseases of the
heart, consumptives, and so on? For instance, that unhappy girl, half
dead, and covered with sweat--would you have bathed her?"
"Certainly not! There are heroic methods of treatment to which, in
practice, one does not dare to have recourse. An icy bath may undoubtedly
kill a consumptive; but do we know, whether, in certain circumstances, it
might not save her? I, who have ended by admitting that a supernatural
power is at work here, I willingly admit that some cures must take place
under natural conditions, thanks to that immersion in cold water which
seems to us idiotic and barbarous.
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