La fig. est un rasoir ou scalpel droit ne tranchant que d'un coste et de l'autre mousse, dont les chirurgiens se servent lorsqu'il ne faut avoir aucun égard aux parties sujettes, scavoir lorsqu'il s'agit de faire des incisions au cuir de la teste jusqu'au crane, &c. Another specimen also of this class, but with the blade so long in proportion to its width as to deserve the name of a blunt-pointed bistoury was excavated in a third-century graveyard at Stree, and is now in the Charleroi Museum. It is 14 cm. long by 1 cm. broad at the heel, widening gradually towards the point where it is 2 mm. broader than at the heel. The end of the blade is square (Pl. VI, fig. 2). An example of the domestic _culter_ or _cultellus_ is shown in Pl. VII, fig. 4. It is from a Roman camp at Sandy in Bedfordshire. In the curious pseudo-Hippocratic treatise (i. 463) a knife to fix on the thumb and dismember a foetus in utero is mentioned: Ἔχειν δὲ χρὴ πρὸς τὰ τοιαῦτα καὶ ὄνυχα ἐπὶ τῷ δακτύλῳ τῷ μεγάλῳ. καὶ διελόντα ἐξενεγκεῖν τὰς χεῖρας κτλ. 'If, however, the foetus be dead and remain, and cannot either spontaneously or with the aid of drugs come away in the natural manner, having liberally anointed the hand with cerate and inserted it in the uterus endeavour to separate the shoulders from the neck with the thumb. It is necessary to have for this a 'claw' upon the thumb and, the amputation having been performed, to extract the arms and, again inserting the hand, to open the abdomen and, having done so to remove the intestines, &c.' An instrument answering to this description is still in use by veterinary surgeons (Pl. VII, fig. 1), but the forefinger, and not the thumb, is used. A scalpel blade is mounted on a ring and the forefinger is passed through the ring. Foals and calves are in this way easily dismembered in exactly the same way as is described by Hippocrates. The name of the instrument of Hippocrates would rather indicate that its blade was curved, but as the modern instrument has a probe point I have included it in this class. It is called by Tertullian the 'ring knife'--'cum annulo cultrato (var. lect. anulocultro) quo intus membra caeduntur anxio arbitrio' (_De Anima_, 26). I. B (_a_) _Straight blade cutting on two edges, sharp-pointed._ (1) Galen's 'long' dissecting knife. (2) Phlebotome. (3) Lithotome. (4) Polypus knife. _Galen's knife for opening the vertebral canal._ In his description of the dissection of the spine Galen describes a large straight two-edged knife (ii. 682): Καθίημι τὸ πρόμηκες μαχαίριον, οὕτω γὰρ αὐτὸ καλῶ δύο πλευρὰς ὀξείας ἔχον ἐπὶ τοῦ πέρατος εἰς μίαν κορυφὴν ἀνηκοῦσας. 'I push in the 'long scalpel', for thus I describe the one with two cutting edges meeting in one at the tip.'