The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-08-25

inventors and at the same time, one of the
most genial of microscopes. His Griffith club
stand, made by Bousch 81 Lamb was seen on
many tables at the soiree. 1t is a full sized
microscope. but packs, with turn-table and
lamp In a bcx seven by nine, and three inches
deep. MIR. Griffith presents the somewhat rare
case of a commercial traveller who is also stu
dent and inventor. He is known to every
worker in the West, and always brings the latest
devices and methods. which he dispenses so
willingly that he has become a kind of foster
parent to the society Dr. j. o. Stlson, of
Indianapolis, showed methods of general micro
scopic work-mounting and finishing slides, ETC.;
DR.. f. ). Newcomer showed how to pick up
and arrange dlatoms with the mechanical
finger by this means using a cats whisker
or a thread Of ine-drawn glass for finger"
the smallest objects, as diatoms, are picked up
turned over, cleaned out and arranged in
complex patterns within a space not larger than
the inside of small plea o.
But most interest is attached to the cutting of
thin sections of soft tissues by the microtome
This ls a comparatively new departure in micro,
scopy, and good modern microtome costs as
much as a good stand-say from $50 to $50.
John Coulter, of Wabash College, makes his
students cut all sections with razor and
sharp one, too. An old thin edged hollow ground
one, which has come down an heirloom
through several generations of preachers, because
of its virtues, is preferred. Sections of soft
tissues must be hardened in alcohol, or
chronic acid; they are also infltrated
with and imbedded in celloidin or in paraffin.
Or they may be frozen hard and
then cut. Btu whatever it is, fat brain, gland,
eye or pulp of fruit, it must be made thin
enough to let light through it, and to show it's
structure; IL must be- cut from one-threehun-
dredth to one-fifteen- hundredth of inch
In thickness. Suppose for example, it is desired
to study the growth of an egg to chicken.
The fresh-laid egg is put in artificial incubator
and kept at hen heat" for say forty eight hours.
By that time the egg is we'll on its way to be a
chicken. The embryo is removed, is hardened
in alcohol or acid is embedded in wax and put in
the microtome The knife is set and the crank
is turned The entire embryo is not as large as
a grain of barley, but it must furnish fifty or
hundred sections from head to tail, although mono
but microscopic at this stage could tell head or
Detroit, showed slides he had prepared at
Heidelberg. on which, within an inch square,
were fastened and stained 125 sections of two
days-old chick. The third, fourth and fifth DAYS
may be carried out in the same way. Dr.. Man
ton read paper on his way of making 'serial
sections" of embryos. This work was actively
going on in the working section. and the two
tables where E. H. Sargent and H. E. Summers
(both junior students of Professor Gage at Cor
nell University were at work with the Bousch
q Lamb microtomes. were surrounded with in
tersted college teachers, doctors and others.
Clip, clip, clip, went the keen-edged knife, and
with each tick went section of brain tumor
which had caused insanity and death, was
H.
a lamprey eel, or mag fsh"-a somewhat rare
fish of our streams, which not nfrequently
fastens on to the catfish with his suckerike
mouth. gnaws through the skin and coils itself
up IN the catfiShs tleSh-waS planted in the par
ATTN, the guillOtine set in motion, and within
three hours the entire fish was cut in sections.
These were placed in order on large slide two
inches square. until it was full and then another
was used. When the sections we're cut from
head to tail, they were freed from paraffin,
stained covered with 'chloroform balsam," and
were ready for the glass. The spinal cord, the
brain. the viscera, the muscles and skin were all
in stu, and every single cell Of the animal
could be studied and its relations established,
even to the epithelim and blood disks.
So much for ''serial sections and staining on
the slidc," as done at Cornell. Very soft tissues
were frozen by ether spray and then cut thin.
Prof. Gage said his Students by practice exceled
their teacher. He said also that the methods-the
''technique,' as some love to call it-of tissue
preparing for the study of histology and pathol-
ogy was advancing so rapidly that no text book
could keep up with the subject and he should re-
frain from writing his microscopic technology
of the common cat'-companion to Wilder and
Cages Anatomy of the Cat'-uEtil both he and
the subject older. Dr. Lester Curtis, of
Chicago, operated ullocks microtome and DR..
Geo. Duffield of Detroit, the Schanzi micro
tome and both did excellent service The time
has come now when every laboratory is COM
PEELED to have one or the other of these instru-
ments. Thomas Taylor. of Buffalo. demon
Ia,
beef tallow, spermaceti and Chinese wax by tho
form of the microscopic crystals The society
seem chary of this method and do not
propose, to ,,i sanction it until it has
has not been done. The only actual difference
between the false butter and the pure butter is
in the soluble fatty acids-butyric add the
like-and any method which does not take note
Of this chemical fact will probably fail in butter
analysis. Pantic, stearic and oleic acids,
which compose most of fats. butter included, are
substances of definite chemical composition and
supposedly crystallizing in definite form irrespect
i've of their deposition as fat Of milk or in con-
nective tissue. Outside of grass examinations
and of chemical analysis to show the proportion
Of soluble and insolube fats, all other methods
have failed this method of DR.. Taylor's is
more than likely to do.
The exhibition Of Interchangeable, and of
the methods both by sunlight and lamplight
were notable feature. They occu-
pied one side of the rink wall. and
were from the best workers in Europe
and America. The structure of wood
of tissues of animals, and of minute structures
generally were shown plain as print and true
to the object as photography always is. Dr. j.
j. Woodward. of Washington, and H. L. Smith,
of Geneva ~ Y, Geo. NJ. Sternberg, u S. A.
and w. IL. Walmsley, of Philadelphia, are all
eminent in this way of making visible to all
what the microscope reveals to the few. The
use of the microspectroscope, the polariscope
electrical and thermal appliances to objects in
the field OF the microscope were all demonstrated
and discussed Everybody had his notebook
out and took such items as he could use or
needed. The session was of great beneft-a kind
of microscopical institute, as teachers would say
1t is matter of some note that the American
Society of Mcroscopists is almost entirely COM
posed of Westernpeople. The shadow of Harvard
College seems to have spread itself all over
New England, and its microscopes are content
to Sit i'll its shade-at least there is represent
alive from New England whatever Many think
it a mistake to have gone as far East as Chau-
tauqua, although ali the New York State meet
ings have been successful.
The whole subject of microscopy is assuming
greater Importance in education and in the arts
year by year. Indiana, in which the society
originated, has not been backward in the use of
the microscope. and many physicians have their