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124 THE MICRO-ORGANISMS OF THE HUMAN MOUTH

in tlie middle of the dentine without connection with perice-
mentum. If primary inflammation of the dentine occurs as often
as we are to infer from the communications of Heitzmann and
Boedecker, then it is very strange that their ol)seryations haye
not been confirmed by other inyestigators. One might think,
too, that by phicing their preparations before the many compe-
tent microscopists in yarious parts of America the question couhl
be yery soon settled l)eyond all doul)t.
It is certainly owing to the authors to examine their pre})ara-
tions irom a perfectly objectiye stand-point, and they also owe it
to us to place their preparations before us in order finally to dis-
pose of a subject of controyersy which has already taken up
enough of the time of the profession. For my own part, haying
spent not a little amount of time in the study of pathological
conditions in human dentine and in iyory, I am forced to accept
the eburnitis theory of Heitzmann and Boedecker (the inflam-
mation, suppuration, and healing of dentine without the inter-
yention of the pericementum or pulp) with a great deal of reserye.
Not, however, haying had the opportunity of examining a prepa-
ration from these gentlemen, I cannot giye any definite opinioiif
as to my idea of the nature of the processes which they haye
styled eburnitis, though I cannot get rid of a lurking suspicion
that it is nothing more than absorption.
Heitzmann and Boedecker ^^ also claim that the yiews com-
monly held regarding the development of dentine and enamel
are false. Neither the odontoblasts nor the ameloblasts take part
directly in the formation of the dentine and enamel, but these
bodies first break up into medullary corpuscles, between which
the dentinal fibers are formed. It is not the place here to discuss
these views. They still await confirmation,
Abbott^^ descril)es decay of a living tooth as "an inflam-
matory process which, l)eginning as a chemical process, in turn
reduces the tissues of the tooth into eml)ryonic or medullary
elements evidently the same as, during the development of the
tooth, Jiave shared in its formation; and its development and
intensity are in direct proportion to the amount of living matter
Ayhich they contain as compared with other tissues."
" Micrococci and leptothrix l)y no means produce caries ; they