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HISTORY OF DENTAL SURGERY 75

nieclianic.al or chemical field. Then, as well as now, the progress and ad-
vancement in dental science and art was encouraged and had its way illum-
ined by the side-lights slied upon it by the discoveries and achievements of
the worhTs best thinkers and investigators in all the realms of scientific and
mechanical activity. As long ago as 1831 this same writer uses this lan-
guage : "Comparatively perfect as the art appears at present, we may reason-
ably hope that it will continue to participate in those important improve-
ments which, in every department of human knowledge, are everywhere mak-
ing around us."'
He also indulged in this prophetic utterance : "The art will continue to
advance; but it will be by the labors of men, who, with profound knowledge,
unite solid judgment and extensive practical experience."
From the present point of view it may appear tliat our grandsires were
as complacent regarding their attainments as many of their professional
descendants of the present day. Casting a retrospect, however, of all that
has been accomplished, we must concede that these pioneers had a broad
and comprehensive estimate of the future possibilities of dentistry, and pos-
sessed a faith that was altruistic in its nature.
But then, as now, there was a class of men reaping some of the rewards
to which the painstaking dentist is entitled. Their ways may not have been
e.xactly like those of the parasites that now fatten upon the well earned repu-
tation of dentistry, but they had "impudent pretenders, who are constantly
pressing upon the public notice, their discoveries of new and infallible reme-
dies, each of which turns out to be either a revival of some antiquated prac-
tice long since exploded, or such a novelty as could only have tiecu devised
by a mind innocent of all knowledge."
Dupont early in the seventeenth century, employed replantation as a cura-
tive method in severe odontalgia. He advised the extraction of the afflicted
tooth and its immediate replacement, and claimed originality for this, practice.
Ilighmore, in 1651, described the maxillary sinus, and the rational treat-
ment of diseases of this cavity which he suggested are in most ca.ses trace-
able to lesions of the teeth concerned.
Christophe Schelhamjuer filled teeth after extracting them and then re-
planted them.
THE AMERICAN COLONIES.
That the Cavaliers of the Old Dominion, that the Dutch along the Hud-
son or the Germans in Pennsylvania, in the early colonial days received any