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208 HISTORY OF DENTAL SUKGEKY

sure, wliich promises to be the most satisfactory method of making inlays
wherever poreehiin is not required. The process in brief is to make a tilling
in the cavity of wax, piepared for the purpose by filtering or otherwise, so
that it will when heated be wholly absorbed into the substance of the mold,
leaving no residue. This wax is fitted into the cavity while plastic by heat
and carefully trimmed and smoothed to represent accurately the form of the
finished tilling. It is then removed from the cavity, a sprue attached and
the whole enclosed in very line investment compound that will take a smooth
surface and will not shrink, and the wax is melted into the investment.' The
easting is done In' means of an apparatus whicli provides for the rapid heating
of the gold considerably above its melting point, and when ready to fill the mold
a tight cover is brought down and pressure applied by means of compressed
air, or the pressure from a cylinder of nitrous oxide gas, which is sufficient to
exert the necessary pressure to fill the mold, which must be done so com-
pletely that the cast inlay will reproduce the form of the wax model to the
minutest detail and the sharpest angles.
There must be many men in various parts of the country equally deserv-
ing of numtion in inlay work, especially in porcelain, as those enumerated.
There is not space to' extend the list, and the writer has not been al)!e to
search through the journals for them.

TREATMENT OF THE DENTAL PULP.=
"The earliest detailed account of the treatment of exposed dental
pulps which is contemporaneous with dentistry in this country, oc-
curs in the work of Robert Wooft'endale ("Practical Observations on the
Human Teeth"), published in London in 1783. Mr. WoofTcndale returned to
this country in 1795, having been in America previously from 17GG to
1768, and from thence resided with us, part of the time in the practice of
dentistry, until his death in 1S'?8 ; therefore his methods were very probably
known and practiced here, at least soon after his second coming among us.
Some extracts from his book will be of interest.
"0/ the Common Toothache.—This kind of toothache is simply the ex-
posed nerve of the tooth, wliich gives pain on pressure of food in mastication,
on its being touched with any hard substance, the application of anything hot
or cold, or the pressure of the atmosphere. When the nerve is exposed, a
small bit of lint, dipped in the oil of cinnamon, cloves, turpentine, or any
1 The heat should be contiuued till the wax model, «hich at first may be largely
absorbed by the investment, is entirely burned out or volatilized.
- History of Dental and Oral Science in America.