In this (the seventeenth) century, also, ophthalmology was much cultivated in France, although it was assigned to the despised surgeons. Those who won most renown in this line were Maitre Jean and Brisseau, who divide the honor of first recognizing the seat of true cataract. During this period, also, Duverney, Professor of Anatomy at Paris, was the first to systematically describe diseases of the ear in accordance with their anatomical seat. In Spain scholarship sank more rapidly during this century than among any other people in history, due mainly to the loss of their political supremacy and their commerce to the Dutch and English, and to the utter failure, at home, of their efforts to introduce true unity of faith. In these efforts the industrious Moors were excluded, under Philip III. In art they maintained their standing,--attaining, in fact, in Murillo, the acme of their fame; but in other branches of industry they rapidly degenerated. Students of history will readily understand how little leisure the Spaniards had at this time to devote to the cultivation of science, including medicine and surgery. Of the two men who are mentioned during this century as Spanish surgeons, namely, Almeida and Ayala, we know practically nothing. The Germans gained no such store of knowledge from their experience during the Thirty Years' War as did the French during their campaigns. The barber-surgeons, for the most part, still reigned supreme, and their guild contained some men of ability and independence of thought. The most notable man of the times was Fabricius Hildanus (1560-1634). Of him, however, I have already spoken as belonging rather to the previous century. He was the first learned{180} German surgeon recognized and esteemed as such by his contemporaries. He was distinguished, also, as an oculist and aurist, and removed a particle of iron from the cornea by means of a magnet. A man of great operative genius, and a born surgeon, was Purmann (1648-1721), who greatly lamented the low condition of surgery in Germany, and regarded a knowledge of anatomy as the prime requisite for the surgeon; he employed the speculum in the diagnosis of syphilis, although it has been Ricord's boast that this was his own idea. Scultetus (1595-1645), of Ulm, was a famous surgical writer of this period, and a bandage of his devising is still in frequent use, and bears his name. Murait, of Zürich, was also a capable surgeon (1655-1733). [Illustration: 0199] The Dutch had but few men during this century who enjoyed any reputation as surgeons. The best among them was Rau (1658-1719), who, from being a poor boy, became a barber, traveled extensively, and was finally made Professor of Anatomy and Surgery in Leyden, where he introduced the innovation of teaching practical surgery upon the cadaver. He was especially famous as a lithotomist after the method of Frère Jacques, although he did not give instruction on this subject in his lectures.