fairs, it is manifest, that any judicious movement of the sound must be fruitlessly employed, unless the stone be of considerable size, or seated near the neck of the bladder. * The pain and spasm so frequently excited on the living body (when tortured with calculi) by the introduction of any instrument into the bladder, must have been noticed by most practitioners who are versed in this branch of surgery; and it is a fact, worthy of observation, and which should not be overlooked by the junior surgeon, that a similar attempt to pass either the sound or catheter on the dead subject, is evidently an operation pregnant with comparatively minor difficulties, seeing that the muscles subservient to these parts have lost their vital energy. + Having thus slightly marked out a few leading impediments in the mode of sounding the bladder (which is scarcely noticed by surgical writers), without entering into a laboured detail of every step and stage relative to the subject, I am induced to infer, that the practical lithotomist will acquiesce with me in having suggested an instrument, the construction of which, when used with skill and adroitness, will surmount most of the incidental obstacles relative to the operation in question. Explanation of the Plate. A. A sound of the common length for an adult, with all that portion of the instrument from the anterior part of the bulb or point to the handle, reduced equally to about one-half its usual thickness or diameter, which diminished form renders it less liable to be acted upon by the urethra. B. The apex or bulb of the sound of the usual proportionate size. C. This part of the handle to be perfectly smooth. Blackburne, Lancashire, December 8, 1816, * In the course of an extensive practice, I have many times been able to detect the stone in the bladder, when other surgeons have repeatedly and fruitlessly employed all their efforts. I have also been in the habit of occasionally sounding the urethra, to ascertain the place and extent of stricture, with this instrument, and sometimes using one made nearly straight, either of which excites less irritation, and is also moved along the canal of the urethra with greater facility than the bougie. VI. Reply to Dr Monro's Observations on the Discovery of the Action of the Oblique Muscles, attributed to Dr Mayow. By G. D. YEATS, M. D. Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, London. DR R MONRO's book of anatomy has recently fallen into my hands, and, in turning over its leaves, I find I am honoured by a notice in nine pages, devoted to prove that the merit I have awarded to Mayow, for a discovery of the true action of the intercostal muscles, has not been correct. In a juvenile work, published above eighteen years ago, it was very possible that the ardour of youth, almost always generous in its feelings, might have overstepped the bounds of correctness in attributing the suum cuique. It was not, therefore, without anxiety, that I turned to my long-forgotten publication, under the apprehension that, in my zeal to draw the public attention to the great genius of Mayow, I might have been his eulogist unjustly, at the expence of the literary reputation of the Monro Family. A reference, however, to the chapter of my publication, has contributed to confirm my original feeling on the subject.+ The anatomist knows that there are two sets of intercostal muscles, viz. the internal and the external; the fibres of the former run downwards and backwards, and those of the latter downwards and forwards, consequently, they decussate each other. Until Mayow published on this subject, it was universally believed, that these two layers of muscular fibres served different offices, viz. that the internal depressed, and the external raised, the ribs during respiration. To combat this doctrine, and to prove that the action of both sets of muscles conspired to raise the ribs and to widen the chest, Mayow devoted a part of his chapter on respiration, with reasonings exemplified by diagrams, and plates of the ribs and intercostal muscles. It is from the expressions which Mayow has made use of to elucidate his meaning, that Dr Monro has endeavoured to prove that he did not understand his subject, and, consequently," that Mayow had no title what * Outlines of the Anatomy of the Human Body, by A. Monro Junior, p. 123-131. Observations on the Claims of the Moderns to some Discoveries in Chemistry and Physiology. By G.D. Yeats, M. D. soever to the discovery, that oblique muscles possess the advantages of performing more extensive motions than straight muscles. are capable of doing."* I must, however, premise, that no such general proposition as that just stated is to be found in the chapter on this subject in my book, and I have not leisure at this time to examine Mayow's work, to discover how far he is entitled to merit upon the broad basis of that proposition. I have indeed admitted, in my publication of 1798, that Dr Monro has very ably extended the principle of obliquity to the action of muscles in general. The whole of the arguments, however, were applied to the co-operating oblique action of the intercostals; and I beg it may be understood, that in this anwer to Dr Monro junior, I strictly confine myself to this particular part of the subject. It appears to me (and I appeal to the learned Professor's candour, as his quondam fellow-student under his venerable and respected father), that his detraction from the just merit of Mayow has arisen from a misunderstanding of (by hasty perusal probably), or from a want of a sufficient attention to, his particular meaning. Dr Monro, indeed, does acknowledge that he did not know, when he wrote his observations, that Mayow had taught that the internal and external intercostals co-operate in inspiration; and I presume he acquired this information, in consequence of having been induced to peruse Mayow, from the praise I had justly bestowed upon him. The following are Mayow's own words: 66 Recepta opinio est, musculos intercostales tantum exteriores dilatando, interiores autem contrahendo pectori inservire. At mihi videtur rationi magis consentaneum ab iis utrisque simul pectus dilatari. Nempe affirmare fas sit, costas sursum tractas pectoris spatium dilatare, deorsum autem retractas idem contrahere. Supponimus enim hic (quod cuivis in sceleto videre datum est), costas cum spina et sterno non secundum angulos rectos articulari, sed angulos infra costas esse paulo recto minores; ita ut si costa sursum trahatur, ejus articulationes cum spina et sterno, versus angulos rectos accedant. Asserimus insuper a costis ad angulos rectos elevatis, pectus dilatari." P. 278-9. "Quandocunque musculus, duobus ossibus affixus contrahitur, os minus fixum ad alterum magis fixum accedit; quapropter, cam inferior quæque costa minus fixa est quam superior, necesse est, ut musculis intercostalibus etiam interioribus se contrahentibus, costa singulæ inferiores sursum trahantur. Imo similis plane ratio obtinet in interioribus musculis ac * Monro's Anatomy, p. 131. |