Page:Recovery from the passage of an iron bar through the head.djvu/18

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I. No attempt will be made by me to cite analogous cases, as after ransacking the literature of surgery in quest of such, I learn that all, or nearly all, soon came to a fatal result. Hence I conclude to leave that task to those who have more taste for it. This case is chiefly interesting to me, as serving to show the wonderful resources of the system in enduring the shock and in overcoming the effects of so frightful a lesion, and as a beautiful display of the recuperative powers of nature. It has been said, and perhaps justly, that "the leading feature of this case is its improbability." This may be so, but I trust, after what has been shown you to-day, that the most skeptical among you have been convinced of its actual occurrence–that it was no "Yankee invention," as a distinguished Professor of Surgery in a distant city was pleased to call it. Moreover, it would seem, when we take into account all the favoring circumstances, that we may not only regard partial recovery as possible, but exceedingly probable. These I will name briefly.

1st. The subject was the man for the case. His physique, will, and capacity of endurance, could scarcely be excelled.

2d. The shape of the missile–being pointed, round and comparatively smooth, not leaving behind it prolonged concussion or compression.

3d. The point of entrance outside of the superior maxillary bone–the bolt did little injury until it reached the floor of the cranium, when, at the same time that it did irreparable mischief, it opened up its way of escape, as without this opening in the base of the skull, for drainage, recovery would have been impossible.

4th. The portion of the brain traversed, was, for several reasons, the best fitted of any part of the cerebral substance to sustain the injury.