the heretofore dried dentine gets well saturated with it. A little of this same carbolic acid may now be mixed with the oxide of zinc (the powder which comes with the packages of chloride of zinc filling material). The carbolic acid which had been placed in the cavity may now be absorbed away with small pieces of soft spunk or other absorbents. This paste of carbolic acid and oxide of zinc, which should be mixed as thick as possible, is now applied over the floor of the cavity and any excess of carbolic acid in the paste should be absorbed from it, with spunk, while at the same time the spunk may be used to flatten or smooth it over the floor of the cavity and over the nearly exposed pulp. Any excess of this paste which may have found its way to the cervical border of the cavity, or indeed to any border or margin of the cavity, should be carefully scraped away. Having proceeded thus far the next effort is to fill the cavity. No metallic filling material would here be indicated-nor indeed would a gutta percha filling be at all serviceable. A chloride of zinc or phosphate of zinc filling material can alone be used in such a case as we have been describing. I give the preference to the former, which, if mixed thick, may be introduced into the cavity over the paste without giving pain.

In cases where there is an exposure of the pulp either by an accidental cut of the excavator in preparing the cavity, or by the ravages of decay, the mode of procedure will be very nearly as described above. The bleeding from the wounded or exposed pulp must be first arrested. Carbolic acid is sufficently styptic for this purpose.

When the bleeding has ceased, the cavity, as before, is flooded with carbolic acid. The paste, as before, is mixed. A small disk, cut from the lead foil which lines tea chests, is cut by means of a rubber dam punch. This disk is laid on a bit of soft wood, and with the

end of the handle of an excavator it is

pressed upon. This leaves it concave on one surface and convex on the other. The concave side is filled with the paste, and this is laid over the exposed pulp, and the cavity filled, as before, with phosphate or chloride of zinc.

The cases most difficult to get comfortable are those where there is a diseased or congested condition of the exposed pulp. We will find sometimes the pulp in one root entirely dead while the part contained in the pulp chamber, and the other root or roots remains alive. In this case the dead pulp should be removed, and the root cleansed and filled. We use for this a paste made of carbolic and salicylic acids, and with a lock of cotton, in which these anticeptics are well incorporated, we fill the root. The remaining part of the pulp we treat with carbolic acid or we sometimes cauterize it with nitrate of silver. We may not fill the case permanently when such complications exist, as frequently the portion of the pulp remaining gives trouble; but by such efforts and frequent treatment we may be successful and save such cases in comfort and usefulness for a long time.

IMPRESSIONS.

[Continued from last Month.]

BY WM. R. HALL.

IN the continuation of this article on impressions, I will say that, while lower impressions are acknowledged to be the most troublesome to take, on account of the interference of the tongue and cheeks, or a few crooked teeth, still, with a tray that is properly adapted to the case, and selection of the proper material, much of the trouble and ill success will be avoided, if there be no teeth to interfere. The case is very simple; take a wax impression, the same as for the upper, cutting out a portion to make room for the plaster, but letting the wax extend outwardly

beyond the tray at the posterior ends, to push away the cheek, which frequently, unless thus pushed away, gets caught between the impression and the gum. After removal the wax is scored with a knife and chilled as usual; fill with plaster. After placing in the mouth, and before pressing down, get the patient to raise the tongue to the roof of the mouth; then press down to its place and hold firmly, until the plaster is sufficently set to remove.

If the incisors and cuspids are the only teeth that remain, the tray selected should have a space cut out for the teeth to pass through freely. In the trays made. for this purpose the space is generally too small.

If, in addition, a molar on each side remain, a lever tray, with straight sides, should be selected.

If a solitary molar be in the way, cut a space in the tray for the tooth to pass through. If the lower maxilla be edentulous, with a thin, sharply defined ridge, I have found the modeling composition make a very good impression if properly cooled before removal. A plate stamped from a zinc model, taken from a composition impression, fits rather loosely upon the gum--and in many cases is more comfortable to the wearer than a closer fitting plate, the pressure being mostly on the top of the ridge.

I might here say that in my experience with modeling composition, I have been quite successful in gaining results that I could not have gained by other material. It requires careful management. Dry heat should be used to soften it instead of hot water. Have the fingers a little dampened with a wet towel. Care must be taken not to fill the tray too full; if pressed to the gum quickly it curls and spreads away from the gum, the same as wax, but if it be pressed slowly it clings to the gum, and before becoming hard the forefinger of the

right hand can be used to press any portion close to the gum that may escape beyond the edge of the tray. It ought not to be removed until quite hard.

The modeling composition can be used to great advantage in taking sectional impressions where the teeth are long and few in number, especially the incisors and cuspids turning inwardly. A tray, with the outside rim removed, should be used, and enough of the composition placed in it to take the inside of the impression. After removal, trim the edge next the teeth square; then replace and hold firmly, while pressing a strip of warm composition against the teeth, letting it lap over the composition first put in the tray; after allowing it to chill remove the outside piece first; when the two pieces are placed together, fasten them with cement.

Where two teeth incline together, so as to form a tringular space, the composition can be pressed in to fill the space, and trimmed to a wedge shape, and a plaster impression taken over it, the two together forming a perfect impression.

Again the composition has become indespensable in repairing old sets of teeth, for the purpose of getting an accurate impression of the space with a tooth or a clasp.

SELECTING AND ADJUSTING ARTIFICIAL TEETH.

BY W. E. DRISCOLL, D.D.S., BEDFORD, IND.

IT is a source of astonishment to me how easily many dentists are satisfied with the patterns of gum teeth usually supplied them by dealers.

I have examined the entire stock of many dealers, and have been compelled to turn away without buying, simply because the lot did not contain anything that would improve my own office supply, and at a time, too, when I felt I was as

good as minus teeth that were suitable for the most common cases.

What was lacking? Why, perhaps in the largest stocks, there would not be a single set that could be adjusted to the gums so that the upper front teeth would not show entirely too much, not only of porcelain, but often of plate rim also.

Yet I saw dentists buying from there lots as if they contained all that could possibly be desired. If such dentists wish to get results that will open their eyes let them order a supply in something like these words:

"Please send me a lot of your gum teeth comprising all the sizes and shades, with pins very near to the cutting edges of the upper front teeth, and with gums very high and thin." "Oh, but they will not be strong enough!" will be the reply of such as must always meet a suggestion with an objection. Try them and see;— you can break them, but it will not be necessary. Try grinding the edge of the gum next the rim perfectly square, and in waxing up do not let any material overlap the gum except at the molars. Then fill around the gums in the flask with plaster, mixed very stiff. Give the plate material time to take form under pressure when closing the flask, and be just as certain to have all perfectly cool before opening; do not grip the plate so hard in the hand as to spring it and crack the gums, and you will break fewer of these thin gums than you did in the old way with the clumsy stumps of porcelain that made their wearer hideous.

By following the above plan, my assistant has not broken more than one block

in the hundred full sets in vulcanizing and finishing, from the beginning of his pupilage to the present time.

And these unbelievers will be as much astonished when I say we cannot recall a a case where one of these thin front blocks has been broken off in use by the patient, while a large part of our work is

replacing front blocks on plates where thick blocks were first used.

How can that be? Very simple, indeed. We set up our cases so that the back teeth receive the force of closing the jaws; while in nine tenths of the cases that come in our way we find the main pressure to be on the front teeth.

It would seem that many dentists never look back of the cuspids to see how the articulation is there. The patient insists on the front teeth fitting firmly or nearly together; knowning, like the dentist,it would seem, little or nothing about the dropping and tipping such an articulation will produce. Thus we get two good results-in preventing breakage, and the tipping and dropping of the plate.

Another point: I wrote to a manufacturer of teeth to ask if he could relieve us, in his future additions of moulds, from the weary labor of grinding away the large, useless lumps of porcelain attached to each end of his blocks of gum teeth. I received a petulant answer that he had never heard any such complaint before, and that with a good corundum wheel it was only a trifling matter to cut away the surplus material. But when I reflected that I could set up two sets of teeth of another nanufacturer with as little hard labor as I could set up one of his make, I decided not to buy at that establishment until the manager came to my way of thinking.

With such extreme quantities of surplus material to cut away, one is liable to lose his bearings, and find, at last, thit he has spoiled a block which could have been casily adjusted had there not been such a bewildering lapse of time between the commencement and finishing of the joints.

About nine tenths, perhaps, of all the artificial teeth we see, are so set on the plate that the outside cusps of the molars and bicuspids strike before the inside cusps do. Then, if the patient closes the jaws a little to one side, a rocking or tipping of the plate is the result, which would not occur if both sides were alike prominent. To overcome this, in some cases the labial surface of the gum must be ground at the joint to remove the "offset" and the surface polished.

The Dental Practitioner

PHILADELPHIA, FEBRUARY, 1883.

-THE Twenty-seventh Annual Com

4. Prosthetic Dentistry: Restoration of features and expression; how best accomplished. 5. Fitting artificial crowns to roots of natural teeth: New and Old methods.

6. Reports of cases in practice.

--DR. J. E. GARRESON depends strict

of Dental Surgery, will be held at the Academy of Music, on Friday, March 2d, at 12 M.

-PHILADELPHIA DENTAL COLLEGE and Hospital of Oral Surgery. This institution holds its Annual Commencement at the Academy of Music, on the evening of February 28th. Friends and others desirous of stage seats can secure them by sending their request to the Dean.

-THE Twentieth Annual Meeting of the Alumni Association of the Philadelphia Dental College, will be held in the College Building, 108 North Tenth street, on Wednesday, February 28th, 1883, at 10 A. M.

The usual supper to the members of the Alumni Association, will be given at St. George's Hall, in the evening at 10 o'clock.

-THE Fifth Annual Reunion of the Alumni of the Ohio College of Dental Surgery will take place in the lecture room of the College, Wednesday, March 7th, at 12 o'clock. Banquet at Kepler's same evening at 10 o'clock.

-THE Mississippi Valley Dental Association, will hold its Thirty-ninth Annual Meeting in Cincinnati at the Ohio. Dental College, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, March 7th, 8th and 9th, 1883. Friday afternoon will be devoted to a Clinic and the exhibition of appli

ances.

SUBJECTS FOR DISCUSSION.

1. Nervous and Muscular affections, dependent on Dental Irritation.

2. Etiology and pathology of dental caries. Treatment by filling.

3. Periodontitis and alveolar abscess, pathology and treatment.

tion for the treatment of cutaneous erysipelas; speaking of it to his class as the nearest approach to a specific with which he is familiar. R.-Tincturæ ferri chloridi,

Tincturæ cinchonæ, Quiniæ sulphatis,

3j: 388:

3j.

M. Sig., Paint over the part every hour.

--A COMBINATION much prescribed in the Oral Clinic department of the Philadelphia Dental College, where stimulation is indicated in the mouth, consists of union in equal parts of tincture of capsicum and tincture of myrrh; the formula is used by adding the medicines to water until the latter is changed in color to a bluish white. It applies most satisfactorily as an injection for alveolar fistulæ.

-ON another page will be found the text of an act to further regulate the practice of dentistry in Pennsylvania. The committee having the matter in charge, request practitioners throughout the State to use their influence with the Senators and Representatives of their respective districts to have this proposed supplementary act become a law.

-THE February number of the Dental Cosmos, contains a paper by Dr. D. D. SMITH, read before the Massachusetts Dental Society, entitled, "Discrimination in the selection and use of Filling Materials," which is replete with so much sound common sense, and so many practical suggestions, that we would gladly republish it if space permitted.

Dr. Smith writes as one who stands aloof from the war of the extremists, and passes his calm judgment upon the merits