Page 129 - My FlipBook

127

trition, can so much blood flow into the teeth ? If the teeth,
after their first formation, receive no supply from vessels, or
did not require any nourishment, it would have been better
if they had been destitute of an internal cavity, and of regu-
lar organization."
*It is always observed, that as persons advance in
life,
their teeth loose that whiteness which they possessed in the
time of youth. This change in the appearance of the teeth
seems to depend upon one which takes place in their cavities,
by which the vessels entering them are gradually destroyed,
and the supply of blood is proportionally diminished. In
the teeth of persons advanced in years, the cavity is very
frequently obliterated, in consequence of a deposit of bony
matter, which entirely destroys the internal organization.
When this happens, the teeth always lose their colour, and
become very yellow, their texture also becomes more brittle,
and they acquire a horny transparency.
When a tooth has become loosened by a blow, and has
afterwards fastened in the socket, a great alteration in
its
colour is the consequence ; it gradually loses its whiteness,
and acquires a darker hue ; this proceeds from the vessels
which enter the teeth, being destroyed, and the teeth conse-
quently losing their supply of blood.
The teeth being constructed like common bones, are gov-
erned by the same laws, and are liable to be affected with
similar diseases ; like them they are affected with the various
causes of inflammation, and have the same diseased appear-
ances produced upon them.
In bones the power of resisting the effects of disease is
in an inverse proportion to their density. The living princi-
ple is always less in the close textured cylindrical bones, and

Fox, History of the Teeth, Part I, Pages 35, 36.