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260 HISTORY OF DENTAL SUEGERY

regularly, and curve from the depth of tlie mouth in order to accommodate
themselves to its concavity. These springs have been made of layers of horn,
of bone, or steel ; spiral springs, that is springs with cylindrical stems, and con-
torted upon its middle part; tliose with double articulated plates, forming a
reactor fixed up the side of the dentures, called grasshopper-legs ; those with
super-placed plates in the manner of a carriage spring, which we had employed
before any autlior had given a description of them; with undulated plate; with
simple and double scrolls ; but spiral springs are the best.
"Bourdet speaks of them in 1756, and Laforgue, in 1785 pretends they were
scarcely known, liut they were used before Fauchard's time, as lie says: 'We
now join two dentures with hinges and springs in the form of a screw, or
curved in a spiral manner.'
"In 1803 Lemaitre presented to the Lyceum at Paris a treatise upon these
springs, which was accepted as a new and proper invention for extending the
limits of art (so say the reporters).
But even if springs are of ancient origin, they have necessarily passed
through many forms and improvements before arriving at a state of perfec-
tion which has rendered their use so frequent.
"The invention of the method of terminating spiral springs with levers
articulating in the middle of each side of the denture belongs to Maggiolo; he
had been conducted by the idea that Eicci had of reducing the length of the
spiral from three inches to one and one-half inches, and to replace the flexible
body with a stiff one.
Maggiolo advised tlie insertion of the springs 'in the middle of the two
lines forming the sides of a square, confining the piece in such a manner that
it would touch in every direction the sides of this square."
Delabarre says: "Place the articulation of the springs in such a manner
that they could not be perceived."
Maury says : "The only precaution we should take to insure success in
the use of springs, is to carefully select their true point of support."
Lefoulon says: "It is only by groping that we can find the proper place
for the support of the springs."
Fauchard gives a description of a curious machine composed of a com-
plete upper denture, united by springs with a piece of gold or silver which
<'mbraces, by means of two half circles, arid of two handles, the teeth of the
ilower jaw.
In making obturators, Ambroise Pare used plates of gold or silver, main-
tained by a sponge attached to a stem, and Alexander Petronius, who wrote
before Pare, said you can stop the hole with wax, cotton, or a gold plate.