of the proximal half of the first phalanx. This has been successfully effected by Mr. Davies-Colley. (4) Osteotomy of the metatarsal bone above the head, with excision of a dorsal wedge proportioned to allow the toe to be placed in a position of slight super-extension, the articulation being preserved intact. It is improbable that any of these more severe measures will be required if the method of forcible reposition be well carried out. HALLUX VALGUS. This, the most common of all digital deformities, may be defined as an eversion of the great toe at the metatarso-phalangeal joint, and in some instances of the phalangeal joint also, with alterations, adaptive or causative, in the bony and ligamentous apparatus of the articulation. It is often accompanied by deformities of the other toes and by flat foot. In its milder forms it must be regarded as a simple malposition caused by the use of boots constructed on the principle of median symmetry; and as this fault is more common in the shoes made for women than in those worn by men, the distortion is far more frequent in the latter sex. In a large number of patients examined by Dr. Robinson and myself in the female wards of the Mile End Infirmary, over ten per cent. were found to be affected in greater or less degree; while in the male wards the proportion did not exceed three per cent. It is a noteworthy fact that the deformity is comparatively rare in the period before puberty. I was able to find only three examples, and these of a very slight kind, among 800 children under the age of sixteen; while incipient hammer toes and hammer fingers were present in considerable numbers. This early immunity is probably due to the fact that the vanity which leads the adolescent to sacrifice comfort to a false elegance has not awakened in the child. The more severe cases of hallux valgus in which the toe is so far everted as to form an angle of from 120° to 90° with the metatarsal bone are comparatively rare, the total number amongst 2600 persons amounting to no more than thirty (twelve male and eighteen female). It is with these that we are especially concerned, and it is probable that they are closely related in origin to hallux flexus.