Chapter 29 Pay attention to hygiene in life
Chapter 29 029 Pay attention to hygiene in life
The Solovyov family lived in Laundry Lane. Although this place was not very eye-catching, there was one thing worth noting: there were public baths and laundry rooms nearby. People who loved cleanliness would always go there to wash to be healthier.
However, sometimes, sanitary environment problems can be avoided not only by relying on good personal hygiene habits.
Solovyov probably knew how many people were killed in a wave of cholera that broke out in Europe more than 30 years later, but he was not quite sure that this time the cholera spread from India, and took more than ten years to spread from Persia to the Ottoman Empire and Russia, and then to France and Britain, causing considerable destruction and panic wherever it went.
In fact, the results were greater than those of the resistance army in the Polish uprising at that time. Many senior generals of Prussia and Russia who led the troops to suppress the Polish uprising were killed. This result was more than some Allied generals killed by the anti-French alliance, and the quality was also higher.
Those who were taken away at once included Gneisenau, Clausewitz, Archduke Constantine and Langeron. The destructive power was shocking.
Vibrio cholerae is an important source of disease. Solovyov does not want to delve into this aspect. After all, microorganisms are not his area of interest. If he wants to conduct research, he still needs to set up a medical school to carry out prevention.
In fact, this is very difficult to do in St. Petersburg now. The only formal "Imperial University" in Russia is the Moscow Imperial University. After 1917, everyone is more familiar with the name Moscow State University. As for other Russian higher education institutions, there is no trace of them at this time. If they are to be truly established, they have to wait until the next tsar ascends the throne and issues an edict, and then a large number of higher education institutions are established in Russia one after another.
Even in St. Petersburg, the environment seems to be a place of book burning and burying of scholars. It is obviously a cultural center, but there is no trace of St. Petersburg Imperial University, the predecessor of St. Petersburg State University. Many European scholars came to the court, including those from Euler and Bernoulli's family, but they were rarely seen living here for a long time. Euler's descendants moved here, but the number of universities in Russia is still a little small.
To be honest, at this moment, if Solovyov wanted to give up his job and go to university for further studies, going to Moscow might not be faster than going to Vilnius or Königsberg.
Of course, Tsar Paul allowed petitions to be submitted, whether under real names or anonymously, and the Russian Tsar would also regularly respond to certain issues in official newspapers, and these responses were addressed to the entire nation.
It's strange to say, Paul looked like a reactionary autocratic monarch, but his actions seemed to have jumped to the opposite camp, while his mother, Empress Catherine, looked open-minded, but was actually more reactionary. Mr. Voltaire could hear the truth about "squeezing orange juice" from Frederick the Great, but in St. Petersburg it was just a facade. No wonder he later chose to live on the Swiss border.
If you really compare them, Louis XVI was a good man, but he was born in the wrong country and era.
Many of the methods that Paul learned during his two trips to Europe have now been gradually put into practice in St. Petersburg.
But there is one thing that Paul overlooked. The core content of his reform was to reduce the exploitation of serfs. However, serfs were the largest in number and wanted to say something to their "little tsar daddy" the most. But they couldn't read. The content from peasants was the least in the petitions, and many were written by local priests. On the contrary, the petitions from the great nobles were submitted the fastest. This was a channel effect.
It is impossible that Paul himself was completely unaware of this, but he was also helpless in dealing with this unique Russian national condition.
However, he had very good interactions with the urban middle class. These people were literate and had some economic foundation. They were able to interact with the Tsar himself on petitions and open letters, which also proved that the method he learned during his trip to Italy was still useful.
When he traveled to Milan and Florence, he saw that the "Lion's Mouth" petition box was open to the public.
Solovyov decided to write an anonymous letter and even changed his handwriting because his handwriting had appeared on the bid documents and he was not so particular about his writing habits now. Changing his handwriting would make it less likely to be exposed when writing the letter.
The content of his letter was to establish a college in St. Petersburg, set up medical schools in major cities in Russia, teach nuns more nursing knowledge in monasteries under the church, etc.
As for whether Tsar Paul himself could see it, he had also inquired about it. People often came to collect letters from the petition box on Million Street, so he delivered them on this street, which was a short distance away from Laundry Lane where he lived.
This way, it would not be easy to be discovered. Anyway, he didn't want to become more famous in other places. Now he was just delivering this letter, which also explained some of the situation.
Sanitary conditions were not taken seriously at that time. Don't listen to a song that says the Elbe River was clean when Emperor William returned. In fact, when you drink raw water, you don't know what pathogens are in it.
Regarding this content, Solovyov actually mainly talked about three parts. The first part was the hygiene of drinking water and the existence of possible pathogens, and also involved some basic content about microorganisms; the second part was about the hospital environment. He did explain one point, believing that medical supplies should be strictly disinfected. The example he gave was very old. During the Athens plague, Hippocrates discovered that blacksmiths were always in high temperature areas and therefore rarely got sick. However, the disinfection content was mainly discussed from the perspective of surgical operations and maternal care.
In fact, this was noticed by an Austrian doctor in the 19th century. In two hospitals in Vienna with similar conditions, the proportion of women suffering from puerperal fever after giving birth was very different, 2% and 20% respectively. The one with the lower incidence rate had adopted a large number of disinfection measures.
However, Solovyov is unable to produce data now, but in theory he should be supported.
The third part involves the nursing situation in the army. Tsar Paul attached great importance to this aspect. In this part, Solovyov mainly mentioned the need to establish a medical system. The taxes "voluntarily" contributed by the nobles could already maintain the operation of some schools.
After these contents are submitted, I hope there will be some results.
Then he returned to the military camp, because for the next period of time, although his hunting company had not arrived yet, he still had to participate in the officers' routine roll call and duties.
In this environment, in November 1797, news came from Vienna and Paris that France and Austria had signed a peace treaty, and Europe might be able to be in a state of peace for a short period of time. In fact, only Britain and France were in hostility. Other countries either made peace or Russia was ready to take the lead in organizing armed neutrality among the Nordic countries. The first armed neutrality was proposed by Empress Catherine. At that time, France, Spain and the Netherlands supported the American War of Independence, while Russia, Prussia and Austria formed an armed neutrality during this period. In fact, it was a big blow to the British. Paul adopted this method again this time because some British policies did damage the interests of Russia.
Moreover, judging from the intercepted letters from the British ambassador in St. Petersburg to his country, he did his best to belittle Tsar Paul. This behavior angered the impatient Tsar himself and led to the ambassador's expulsion for a time.
The Tsar did not care what was said in diplomatic letters, but when this private letter was intercepted, such content appeared. Obviously, it was unacceptable for the Russian Tsar.
After he issued the expulsion order, he did not actually refuse it. It was more like a "minor penalty" in ice hockey. He only banned the ambassador from conducting diplomatic activities for a short period of time and returned to Britain to "reflect on his actions." At the same time, Count Vorontsov, the Russian ambassador to London, was also active in London.
At this time in Russia, there was no assassination conspiracy group formed in St. Petersburg, and Tsar Paul's own policies had not yet reached the abstract level they would later become. After learning that France and Austria had made peace, he wrote letters to the British Prime Minister, the French Directory and the Austrian Emperor, expressing his hope to promote peace in Europe, that there should be no more wars in the future, and that diplomatic norms should be established.
This won’t be the last time we have to deal with the British ambassador, and there will be bigger ones in the future.
Lord Huisworth's attempt to influence Paul through pro-British Russian Foreign Ministry officials did have some effect. At least between Britain and France, Paul was still committed to France at this time because of the Directory's actions and his past visits to Europe with Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette.
The British were well aware of this. Even though Tsar Paul had some opinions about Lord Whisworth, who had been in St. Petersburg for a long time, in 1797, it would not ruin Anglo-Russian relations.
Of course, if the British diplomatic efforts were not spent on real money, it would be difficult to achieve any results in St. Petersburg.
Regarding this outrageous diplomatic incident involving the British ambassador, when Tsar Paul saw the petition, he thought that in order to get some "sponsorship" from all sides in St. Petersburg, he would of course allocate funds himself and plan to build a school in St. Petersburg in 1800. The British would probably be willing to pay this amount of money.
After all, if the British wanted to contain France at sea, they could only look for allies on the European continent and give out money to solve the problem. Otherwise, if Prussia, which appears strong but is weak but loves to take advantage, turned to the opponent, Hanover's stronghold might be gone.
They were now having a wild idea that the Tsar wanted Britain to sponsor the cost of building a school in St. Petersburg. Since this didn't seem to cost much, it was still acceptable.
As for the issues of disinfection and sanitary environment, Tsar Paul himself attached great importance to this aspect, especially when it came to the health of his soldiers.
Although Solovyov's petition was unsigned, its content made a lot of sense. It was obvious that he had some understanding of Paul's psychological state. He was eager for quick success and wanted to achieve some results to prove that he was a qualified Emperor of All Russia. The ongoing plan to improve the treatment of soldiers and the construction of military hospitals and medical and health systems were not a problem for him.
However, when Paul carried out the financial reform, he exempted a large amount of overdue poll taxes, which amounted to 700 million rubles, equivalent to 350 million taels of silver. But he also recovered a lot of money from other places. He was very clear about the large taxes owed by the nobles.
After getting back the overdue taxes, Paul did not spend much on himself. The luxurious palace and various expenses left by his mother were enough for him. The king usually wore Prussian black military uniform, Russian medals, and patrolled the palace and military camps with a cane. The expenses in this regard were obviously only part of the investment in artworks and palace maintenance, and the expenditure had been greatly reduced.
Although palaces, gardens, and cities were being built, some palaces had been converted into military camps. Except for the Guards of the Prussian Regiment who could live in the Winter Palace, the garrisons from all over the country moved into the vacant palaces as military camps. Some nobles thought that this affected their lives, but the soldiers were concentrated and did not actually cause trouble on the streets. Usually, the distance between these garrisons and their original stations was not too far, so small merchants and vendors were not greatly affected.
So Paul completely ignored the nobles' opinions about the army moving into the palace as a barracks, and the soldiers also supported him more. After all, the garrison now had warm winter houses. Although they still had to rely on themselves for heating, the environment was much more spacious than in citizens' homes or outdoor barracks, and they could even store more personal belongings.
It's just that in the eyes of some people, this is a destruction of "culture".
But think about those great nobles, whose manors are located on open land, and actually only have a small table in the empty reception room for dining, and a serf band in the garden to provide accompaniment while they take walks, what do they think about this?
However, the retired generals expressed strong support for the Tsar's action. The soldiers did need a better living environment, and improving their treatment included not only military pay, but also other benefits.
The army began to set up rear hospitals in governor-general districts and train doctors and nurses, which was also a huge progress.
Solovyov received a reply to his letter on November 1797, 11, and the Tsar himself published a page in the designated newspaper to explain the importance of a sanitary environment in response to the letter from an "anonymous person".
It was just like when Peter the Great cut his beard in the past, but this time the nobles had no objection. Apart from paying money, it seemed to be beneficial to them as well. In particular, there were many men who joined the army who did not have wives and children. Having a hospital in the barracks would improve conditions, and when a doctor was really needed on the battlefield, the officers would be the first to get a number.
This was also the time when Paul encountered the least resistance when implementing his reforms.
He also set an example himself. As early as when he was still the crown prince, in order to thank the doctors for their superb medical skills that helped him recover, he had been sponsoring the operation of the Pavlovsk Hospital based on the Empress's order. The hospital was established in 1763 and was the first "civilian hospital" in Moscow.
This time, after replying to the letter, he also issued an edict, requiring the new health regulations to be implemented in the Pavlovsk Hospital. He also encouraged the nobles to establish hospitals for medical and charitable purposes.
(End of this chapter)