Page 180 - My FlipBook

164 HUNTER ON THE TEETH.
Thus in appearance, it will remain sometimes for many years
but there will be more or less of a change going on ; Nature
•will be attempting to make up the deficiency, by endeavouring
to increase the Stump ; for in many cases we find the Stumps
thickened and lengthened at their terminations, or small ends
;
but it is a process she is not equal to, therefore no advantages
accrue from it. When she either fails in this process, or is in
such a state as not to attempt it, then by this condition of the
Tooth a stimulus is given to the alveolar processes, which
produces a filling up of the socket from the bottom, whereby
the Stumps are gradually protruded. But although they are
pushed out at the bottom, they seldom or never project farther
beyond the gum than at first ; and that part of the Tooth
which projects, seems to decay in proportion to its projection.

arrested, have a semi-transparent waxy look, arising from the consoli-
dation of the dentinal tubes previously referred to as one of the effects
of caries, and from the formation of new dentine by which the canal
of the fang has become partially closed up. These stumps are
not entirely dead, but retain a low amount of vitality from the
supply of the nutrient fluid received from the periosteum, and in-
vesting layer of cementum. They often remain for years without
producing any annoyance, until inflammation is set up in the peri-
osteum. Should caries arise in a stump, it generally attacks the centre,
which, becoming hollow and worn away, forms a kind of cup where
particles of food and the fluids of the mouth accumulate, and by their
direct action or their decomposition, give rise to destruction of the den-
tine. This destructive process proceeds towards the exterior of the
fang, and downwards towards the apex, until at length the stump is
reduced to a conical hollow shell of osseous matter. While this is going
on, one of two things happens, either inflammation arises in the perios-
teum producing great pain, and terminating in a purulent discharge,
which necessitates the extraction of the stump, or the stump, gradually
losing what slight amount of vitality it possessed, becomes a foreign
body, and nature, by a double process of absorption, the one taking
place around the apex of the stump, the other in the surrounding tissues,
ultimately expels it from the mouth. Stumps are often the seat of
exostosis ; when, however, they are about to be expelled from the mouth,
this is absorbed, leaving a ragged projecting extremity, which is some-
times mistaken for a new growth.]