one,
showing radiating fissures exact length. The exit in the frontal region
was of typical explosive character. Range '100 yards'.]

The amount of fissuring at the aperture of entry was often not so
extensive as I had been led to expect. Fig. 61 is a diagram illustrating
a fairly typical instance; in some cases no fissuring existed. As a rule
the nearer to the base, the greater was the amount of fissuring
observed. The fissures were sometimes very extensive in this position,
probably as a result of the lesser degree of elasticity in this region
of the skull. Again, when the aperture of entry was near the parts of
the vertex where sudden bends take place, considerable fissuring of the
same nature as that seen in the superficial tracks (fig. 68) was
produced in the flat portion of the skull above the point of entrance.

Radial fissuring around the aperture of entry in the skull scarcely
corresponds in degree with that seen when the shafts of the long bones
are struck, and is far less marked and regular than when one of these
small bullets strikes a thick sheet of glass set in a frame. I saw
several apertures in the thick glass of the windows of the waterworks
building at Bloemfontein produced by Mauser bullets. They differed
little from the opening seen in an ordinary plate-glass window resulting
from a blow from a stone, except perhaps in the regularity and
multiplicity of the radial fissures. As in the skull, the opening was a
little larger than the calibre of the bullet, and the loss of substance
on the inner aspect considerably exceeded that on the outer.

The degree of fissuring is probably affected by the resistance offered
by the particular skull, or the special region struck, but as a rule the
elasticity and capacity for alteration in shape possessed by the bony
capsule, is opposed to the production of the extreme radial starring
observed in the long bones or a fixed sheet of glass. Corroborative
evidence of the influence of elasticity in the prevention of starring is
seen in the limited nature of the comminution of the ribs in cases of
perforating wounds of the thorax.

In the most severe cases we can only speak of the 'aperture' of exit in
a limited sense in so far as the opening in the scalp is concerned; this
was often comparatively small, not exceeding 3/4 of an inch in diameter.
Beneath this limited opening in the soft parts, the bone of the skull
was smashed in a most extensive manner. The portion exact