Page 331 - My FlipBook

THE EICIITEENTII CEXTLRr 309

hand, for in it SchattVr rcpi-ars in suhsrancc what Ihninin- had alnads
said two centuries earlier, and afrtr him xarious orhii auihois, iiuhidin<'
Fauchard. At an\- rate, to coiiperatc in tin- coniplrtr ilistnution ol" inor
and in the diffusion of truth is al\va\s hiuchddr. \\i- feci, lioutvcr,
hound to add that in the very same year in whirh Sihaflcr's pamphhr
was puhhshed, Dufour, a Frenchman, descrihed a worm that had hiin
taken out of a decayed tooth, and called attention to tiie tact that it was
altogether different from the "dental worms" descrihed In Andr\.'
BoURDET. An excellent hook on dentistr\ ' appeared in Fiance in the
year 1757, the work of Bourdet, a celehrated dentist and ele<;ant writer,
in whom the gilts of literar\' and scientific culture were coupled with a
vast experience and a profound spirit of ohservation. His merits |iro-
cured him the honor of being appointed dentist to the King.
This author condemns as harmful the use of hard substances (such as
bone rings, etc.) that people are in the habit of putting into children's
hands during the period of the first dentition, in the idea that In pressing
these objects between the gums, as children instinctiveU do, the\' cut their
teeth more easily. As to emollients, he holds them to be completely
useless, and prefers to all these remedies the use of lemon juice.
According to Bourdet, the teeth are so apt to decay, partly because of
the frequent changes of temperature to which they are exposed, and
partly because, differently from the bones, they are not provided with any
protective organic covering.
In many cases of caries, Bourdet extracted the tooth, filled it with lead
or gold leaf, and replanted it; but if, in extracting, the aKeolus had been
somewhat injured (a thing very likely to happen with the instruments
of the period), he replanted the tooth immediately, to preserve the alveolus
from the damaging action of the air, and carried out the stopping at a
later time.
Even in certain cases of violent toothache not depending on caries,
Bourdet luxated the tooth and replaced it in position directh . But as
some dentists had accused him of having passed off as new an operation
already made known by Mouton since the year 1746, Bourdet defended
himself by saying that whilst Mouton only shook the tooth, raising it a
little, simph' to distend the nerve, he, instead, effected a complete luxation,
in order altogether to interrupt the continuit\- of the nerve. An\how,
this operation was not new, as it had alread\' been recommended and
practised by Peter Foreest, in the sixteenth century, and in an e\en more
remote epoch by the Arabian surgeon Abulcasis.

' Recueil periodique d'observations de Medccinc, Cliirurgic, etc., par Vaiulcriiif)ndf,
Paris, 1757, Tome vii, p. 256.
' Recherches et observations sur routes les parties de I'art du dentiste, 2 vols., l^aris, 1757.