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202 THE TREATMENT OF TEETH

its many disadvantages, he still continues to practise
a method that is, in his hands, a much simpler and
equally good, if not better, procedure. That is to
thoroughly dry up, harden, and presumably sterilise
the soft floor, and then fill the tooth. Failures may
occur through errors of judgment or from the
the peculiarity of the case. But failures occur from
the same causes in destroying and removing pulps,
and filling or attempting to fill root canals. There
is another little point in the preparatory treatment
of all cavities, whether they contain soft dentine or
not, and that is that if a cavity is properly prepared
for a filling, and then temporarily filled with gutta-
percha, it is found that the cavity is much more
sensitive on the removal of the gutta-percha. This
has led many men to suppose that gutta-percha
causes sensitiveness of dentine. It is the writer's
opinion that this increased sensitiveness is merely
due to the increased irritability that all sensitive
tissue shows after it has been lacerated or cut.
If the precaution is taken to seal up a dressing
of tannin paste, or creosote, or carbolic acid, &c., in
the cavity by means of the gutta-percha, a decrease
rather than an increase of sensibility will be noticed.
The lacerated dentine is thus soothed or cauterised,
instead of being allowed to rebel against the cutting.
The rapidity with which a fairly thick layer of soft