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236 PATHOLOGICAL CONDITIONS.

alkalies, salts, &c. In regard to degree, extent,
and location, this affection exhibits a variety of
manifestations; in degree, from the most mild to
the most intense—sometimes fixed at a uniform pitch
of pain, and sometimes passing through the gamut of
torture up to the most acute anguish. The character
of the affection is modified by differences in the
organic structure of the teeth, those most vascular
and most highly organized being most readily and
most extensively involved ; and therefore the teeth
of the young are generally more liable to it than

those of the old. So, too, persons of a plethoric or a
strumous habit, as well as those in a febrile condi-
tion, are peculiarly predisposed to this affection.
Sometimes irritation or disturbance of other organs of
the system, sympathetically or secondarily induce
inflammation of the dentine. Uterine irritation fre-
quently does so ; and hence, during pregnancy or a
protracted suppression of the catamenia, the teeth are
very liable to be thus affected, and, if decayed, to

become very sensitive.
Inflammation of the dentine will sometimes be
exhibited in various degrees in different teeth in the
same mouth at one time. This is owing to differ-
ences in the organic structure of teeth developed at
different periods of life, to differences of their loca-
tion in the mouth, and to differences of exposure to