Page 76 - My FlipBook
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and canini, almost gelatinous and of a smaller size, .which
lying behind the former ones, and in their proper cavities,
were placed directly opposite to one another. I confess I
did not see any trace of the grinders and jaw teeth which
appear about the seventh year, and often much later."
Urbain Hemard, an ingenious French anatomist, makes use
of nearly the same words, when treating on this subject.*
" He had dissected in presence of his friends, capable of un-
derstanding this demonstration, several infants three or four
days old, others just born ; he says that the incisores, the
canini and some molares on each side of the jaws, were in
part bony, and in part mucilaginous, of middling size, and
surrounded by their little cases or sockets ; that after having
removed the first incisores and canine teeth, he observed a
bony partition ; and that after having likewise removed this,
he met under it, as many new incisores and canine teeth, as
there were of the first, almost entirely mucilaginous. But
as to the great molares, which at seven or eight years
old, or a long time after, begin to appear through the gum,
he confesses, he never found any trace or beginning of
them." It appears that Urbain Hemard was not acquainted
with Eustachius's work, so that he is entitled to an equal
share of merit ; and although the celebrated Albinus con-
firms the description of these parts, as related by Eusta-
chius, yet Dr. Nesbitt thought them imaginary and says,f
" There is not at birth, as Eustachius imagined, the least ap-
pearance that I could ever find of the layer or row of teeth,
by which the first is afterwards usually thrust out." Since
so great an anatomist as Dr. Nesbitt did not credit the demon-
strations of Eustachius, though supported as I have already
* Fauchard Chirugien Deutiste, page 37, &c.
+ Hum. Osleogony, page 98.