This operation is still not practised often enough, especially among poorer patients; amongst whom many practitioners still treat phimosis as a matter of but little importance. Some of the pretensions set forth above on behalf of circumcision will be subsequently referred to; but on the plea for a general extension of the rite to nations not impelled thereto by special Divine command, it may be remarked that several Jewish surgeons who have written upon the topic by no means regard this with an eye of favour; and have, in fact, gone even so far as to denounce in the strongest terms its compulsory performance among their co-religionists.[12] For their dislike, they advance what appear to be very adequate reasons; and, in such a matter they must have enjoyed a far wider special experience than any practitioner without the Hebrew pale. The following extract from Erichsen's _Science and Art of Surgery_ (Ninth Edition, 1888) may be regarded as a typical account of the ordinary surgical operation in vogue at the present day. The italics are the present writer's: Circumcision in boys or adults may be most conveniently performed in the following way. The surgeon restrains hæmorrhage during the operation by tying a tape tightly around the root of the penis, or by compressing the organ in Clover's circumcision tourniquet, a most useful instrument, which can be slackened or tightened at any time. He next draws the elongated prepuce slightly forwards, until the portion of it which corresponds to the back of the glans is brought just in front of that structure. He then seizes the projecting prepuce immediately in front of the glans with a pair of narrow-bladed polypus-forceps, which he gives to an assistant, who must hold them tightly; or he grasps it and protects the glans by means of a plate which I have had constructed for this purpose. With one sweep of the bistoury he cuts off all that portion of the integument which projects beyond the forceps, which are then taken away. It will now be found that he has removed only a circle of skin, but that the mucous membrane lining it still tightly embraces the glans; this he slits up, by introducing the point of a pair of scissors at the preputial orifice; and then, trimming off the angles of the flaps, he turns back the mucous membrane and attaches it to the edge of the cutaneous incision by a sufficient number of fine catgut sutures. Before introducing these, he will generally find it necessary _to ligature a small artery on each side of the penis, and one or two in the frænum_. The best dressing in children will be some simple ointment, such as boracic acid ointment, or the glans may be simply smeared with a little vaseline. After every act of micturition the parts should be well sponged with boracic acid lotion or Condy's fluid and water.