105. This method, almost universally adopted in latter times, and approved of by Louis, was in vogue at the hospital of Charity, when Desault entered it. Ought we then to be surprised, that the fracture was considered as incurable? Here indeed the plainest and most important indication is evidently disregarded. Nothing to retain the fragments in apposition, nothing to prevent them from being constantly moved. Does not the method of Foubert very closely resemble those experiments, in which, the bone of an animal is broken intentionally, and then to prevent a reunion and form an artificial joint, the fragments are kept in constant motion? 106. Will any better success attend the method of securing the leg, as Dalechamp recommends, to the foot of the bed? In such a case the trunk and the pelvis glide down along the inclined plain made by the pressure of the nates (14), and hence a constant cause of the shortening of the limb. 107. The second class of curative means, includes different forms of apparatus simply retentive. Pare, Petit, and Heister, recommend, as most useful, the _Spica_ of the groin.[26] But what effect can this produce? What force applied in that part can keep the lower fragment down, and the pelvis up, secure the immobility of the limb, and prevent its rotation outwards? If the bandage be tight, it will compress the muscles unequally, make them contract, and thus become the cause of a contraction or shortening of the limb. In some respects, there is more advantage to be derived from the tin case lined with cloth on its inside, which Fabricius of Hilden applied to the external part of the thigh; a method which has been renewed since his time, by certain celebrated practitioners of Germany; from the pasteboard case proposed by Duverney as a substitute for that of tin; from the retentive plaster[27] of Buffle employed likewise by Arnaud; and from the splints adopted by most practitioners. But can these means, (so differently varied in form, yet still the same in their action), while they prevent displacement laterally or in the cross-direction of the bone, prevent it also in the longitudinal direction, which latter ought to be the principal object in view? Will they make any resistance to the muscular action? See what has been already said on splints, bandages, &c. (89 ... 95). [26] _Le Spica de l’aine._ TRANS. [27] (_L’ecusson._) The literal meaning of this word is an escutcheon, or a coat of arms. But when used in surgical language, it signifies a retentive or strengthening plaster. Such I conceive its meaning to be in the present instance. TRANS.