er apparatus.

Fortunately we possess here in America, in the Surgeon General's Library
at Washington, a very interesting manuscript containing Ardern's
surgical writings, though it has not yet been published. Even a little
study of this and of the notes on it prepared by an English bibliophile
before its purchase by the Surgeon General's Library, serves to show how
valuable the work is in the history of surgery. There are illustrations
scarcely less interesting than the text. Some of these illustrations
were inserted by the original writer or copyist, and some of them later.
In general, however, they show a rather high development of the
mechanics of surgery at that time. Some of the pages have spaces for
illustrations left unfilled, so that evidently the copyist did not
complete his work. The titles of certain of the chapters are
interesting, as illustrating the fact that our medical and surgical
problems were stated clearly in the olden time, and thinking physicians,
even six centuries ago, met them quite rationally. There is, for
instance, a chapter headed "Against Colic and the Iliac Passion,"
immediately followed by the subheading, "Method of Administering
Clysters." The iliac passion, _passio iliaca_ of the old Latin, is
usually taken to signify some obstruction of the intestines causing
severe pain, vomiting, and eventually fecal vomiting. A good many
different forms of severe painful conditions, especially all those
complicated by peritonitis, were included under the term, and the modern
student of surgery is likely to wonder whether these old observers had
not noted that the right iliac region was particularly prone to be the
source of fatal conditions. There is a chapter entitled "Against Pain in
the Loins and the Kidneys," followed by the chapter subheading, "Against
Stone in the Kidneys." There is a chapter with the title, "Against
Ulceration of the Bladder or the Kidneys." Another one, with the title
"Against Burning of the Urine and Excoriation of the Lower Part of the
Yard." Gonorrhea is frankly treated under the name _Shawdepisse_,
evidently an English alliteration of the corresponding French word. As
to the instrumentation of such conditions and for probing in general,
Ardern suggests the use of a lead probe, because it may readily be made
to bend any way and not injure the tissues.

MEDIEVAL SURGERY

Even this brief account of the surgeons who taught and studied at the
medieval universities demon