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240 THIRD PERIOD—MODERN TIMES

developed after a badly performed dental extraction. It was to be foreseen
that the ablation of such a tumor would give rise to an abundant hemor-
rhage. This was, however, staunched by simply using astringent powders,
without having recourse to the actual cautery, which the operator had
held in readiness.^
Daniel Major, wishing to remove a large epulis by tying it, was
obliged, in order to keep the ligature in position, to pass the thread through
a circular incision made at the base of the tumor. He first used a
thread of silk, afterward a silver one, and tightened the ligature every
day until the epulis fell ofF.^
JoHANN AcoLUTHUS was obliged, in order to extirpate a large epulis,
to previously split the labial commissure. After the ablation of the
principal mass of the tumor, he destroyed the remaining part of it by
application of the red-hot iron.^
One reads of other cases of epulis in Stalpaart van der Wyl, Mercklin,
Preuss, Bern, Valentini, etc. This last author even speaks of an epi-
demic of epulis. However this may be, it is very probable that epulis
was much more frequent in past times than it is now, and this probably
depended partly on the incongruous modes of treating diseases of the
mouth, and partly on the slight attention paid to cleanliness of the teeth.
KoRNELis VAN SooLiNGEN, a Celebrated Dutch physician and surgeon,
who flourished toward the end of the seventeenth century, speaks con-
temptuously of dental operations, and especially of extractions. He says
that such operations ought to be left to charlatans, used to taking out
teeth with the point of the sword, and to doing many other things of like
nature! This unjust contempt was at that time widely diffused in the
medical class, it resulted, however, substantially, from the great difficulties
encountered by doctors and surgeons in general, in performing the
operation of extraction, owing to want of practice, and also from the
desire to avoid the responsibility of the accidents to which the extraction
might give rise; so true is this, that an author of the preceding century,
Theodor Zwinger (1538 to 1588), a celebrated Swiss doctor and pro-
fessor at Basle, had declared with great frankness that the extracting of
teeth ought to be left to barbers and charlatans, as it might easily occasion
unpleasant accidents, such as fractures of the jaw, laceration of the gums,
serious hemorrhage, and the like.
In spite of his contempt for practical dentistry, Kornelis van Soolingen
takes the treatment of dental affections into attentive consideration. For
the stopping of carious teeth, he recommends a mixture similar to that
which Rha/cs had recommended many centuries before, that is, a cement
of mastic and turpentine; because, says he, when the stopping is made

' Op. cir., c;i|i. xwin, p. 120. - Spiengel, vol. ii, p. 298. ' Sprenml, loc. cit.