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the negroes nave so much better teeth, as a general rule, than
the white inhabitants. Behind their thick lips, they conceal
a peculiar rotundity of the jaw which
is very favourable to
the perfect developement of the teeth ; and for the same
reason, and some others, men in general, have better teeth
than women. To prove that cleanliness has a great effect
in preserving the teeth from decay, we have only to notice
the difference in the disposition to decay in the different teeth
of the same individual. As an example, whilst we notice

decay to have commenced in the front upper incisors, and in
the grinding teeth of both jaws, we often, and most gene-
rally notice, that the front under incisors are perfectly sound,
and I never saw the under incisors diseased, and the upper
in health, and I believe
it is the experience of every dentist,
that he has occasion to operate upon, and to replace a vast
many more upper than under incisors, and the reason of this
demonstrates, my first positions ; and it is, that these teeth
are kept clean by mastication, and they seldom crowd upon
each other, except at their very upper points, and, therefore,
they are kept free from, and enabled to resist those agents,
in a great many instances, which produce the decay of the
other teeth.
I will not deny, and firmly believe, that in some instances,
from constitutional or local causes, decay does commence
within the substance of the tooth, but I must say, with
Mr. Hunter, whose acumen as to matters of observation has
been seldom surpassed, that this commencement of decay
occurs very rarely.*
Having spoken of what Messrs. Hunter, Fox, and Koecker
define to be deep-seated caries, and having given an opinion,

• See Hunter, Part II, page 137.