Page:The Harveian oration 1905.djvu/77

 and precisely the movements of the heart and arteries; or for studying certain details as regards the circulation of the blood, the size of the arteries, arterial tension and blood-pressure, venous pressure and pulsation, or other particular phenomena. It will be well within the recollection of many now present when the sphygmograph and cardiograph were introduced, and previous Harveian Orators have waxed eloquent over the wonderful revelations which were to be anticipated from the sphygmograph more especially, and the practical advantages which were to be derived from its use. No doubt it has given us valuable information on certain points, but whether the anticipations regarding this apparatus have been adequately fulfilled may be a matter of opinion. The numerous other instruments which have been brought under our notice for the study of the circulatory system I will not on the present occasion even venture to name, and cannot do better than refer you to the lectures and published writings of Dr. George Oliver, who has dealt with the subject on comprehensive and practical lines, and has by his personal investigations contributed materially to our physiological, clinical, and therapeutic knowledge concerning this system.

4. The medical profession is, as a matter of course, more immediately interested in and concerned with the morbid conditions which affect the circulatory