Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1882-09-30
Skin Grating.

The patient, pretty little girl of eight.
was admitted into the Wellington ward of
St Georges Hospital with the history that,
Two years previously. her dress had caught
fire, burning both legs from the hips to the
knees severely. After wears treatment the
left thigh had healed up; but the right had
never got better. and presented a terrible
ulcer. extending all down the outer side. She
was a bright, intelligent little thing, and her
sad condition excited much sympathetic in
terest. For four months she lay there with
out any signs of improvement. Though
nourishng food, with wine and strengthen
ing medicines, was freely administered, and
all manner of local remedies applied, particu-
larly that most excellent dressing, carded
oakum. all was in vain; and when, on the
5th of Nav, the child was brought into the
operating theatre, and placed under the in
fiuence of rhlorotorm, il certainly appeared
TO us To be as unlikely case to
afford a fair criterion of new treat
ment as could well be imagined. Two small
pieces of skin were then shipped from the
back with a pair of sharp pointed scissors,
and imbedded-planted. in fact--in the
granulations or proud flesh" of the wound
two tiny atoms. scarcely bigger than pins
head, and consisting of little more than the
cuticle or outer skin which we raise in
blisters by rowing or exposure to hot SUM-
Five days later no change was visible; and
by and-by the operation was considered to
have failed, since the pieces of skin had dis
appeared, instead of growing, as had been
expected. But IL days after the operation
two little white cicatrices appeared where
the seeds had been sowD; and in
my notes l find that week later
these were big enough to be dignifed
as "slands of new tissue The most won.
tprful a II 10 TINT mi nplv did tbpaA
islands grow and increase rapidly in circum-.
ference, but the fact of their presence seemed
to stimulate the ulcer itself, which forthwith
took on a healing action around its margin.
Several more gratis were implanted subse-
quenily, including morsels from Mr.. Pollock's
arm, from my own, and from the shoulder Of
negro: the last producing white.scar
tissue like the rest In two months the
wound was healed, and the little patient was
discharged cured.
Skin-grafting is now performed daily in
surgical practice. and a special instrument
a combination of knife and scissors--has been
invented for the purpose. Ii is impossible
to estimate the immense benefit of this dis
covery to mankind in many different aspects.
Poor people heretofore iucapacitated from
labor by ''incurablc" ulcers and for years a
burden on their parish. or inmates of work
houses and asylums, will now again resume
their place ia the great toiling hive, from
whose daily work is distilled the prosperity
of a nation. Won Crates operation of ride
otomy. whereby hundreds of people, who were
formerly considered irremediaby blind are
now restored to sight by a simple proceeding
Ii is said to have exercised very appreciable
effect on the poor-rates of the country As an
instance oftrue transplantation, John Hunters
celebrated experiment of causing a human
tooth to take root and grow in the comb Of q
cock is a well-known instance. Dentists
nowadays often remove teeth, and having ex-
cised diseased portions, replant them In their
sockets with frequent. though not invariable.
success and cruel plastic operations have
been performed on rats. by which they have
been joined like Siamese twins. or their tails
caused TO grow from their shoulders, or be-
tween their eyes. The late Mr.. Frank Buck
land, in his Curiosities of Natural History,
gives an amusing account of an action n-at-law
brought by M. Trignel, a French naturalist,
against Zouave who had sold him what was
termed a ''trumpet-rat" for 100 francs; the
said trumpet rat proving to be an ordinary
''varmint," with the tip Of another rats tail
planted in its nose, and growing there
Chambers journal.