In other chapters of Book VI., Paulus furnishes most interesting and minute descriptions of a great variety of operations in general surgery and also in obstetrics, ophthalmology, otology and rhinology. Those who desire to learn further details about these surgical matters should consult the English version mentioned on a previous page. It is not at all unlikely that at some future day it will be found desirable--by reason of the discovery of the treatises which they are known to have written, but which have been lost--to add to this short list of ancient medical authors the names of the following men who are frequently quoted by them in their works: Antyllus, who made some really valuable additions to our knowledge of the proper manner of treating aneurysms, and who must have been a surgeon of great resourcefulness; Leonides, the Alexandrian, who lived about the time of Galen, and who appears to have been highly considered for his practical common sense in the choice of surgical measures; Hesychios of Byzantium and his distinguished son, Jacobus Psychrestus, who was highly spoken of by his contemporaries (fifth century A. D.), in whose honor a public statue was erected (Haller), and to whom is attributed the saying: “A good physician should either decline at the start to take charge of a patient, or else he should not leave him until he shall have brought about some measure of improvement”; finally, Heliodorus, and perhaps a few others who are less well known. CHAPTER XVIII BEGINNING OF THE ARAB RENAISSANCE UNDER THE CALIPHS OF BAGDAD Toward the end of the sixth century A. D. the prospects for the perpetuation and further evolution of Greek medicine looked decidedly dark. In Rome and in the larger Italian towns of the Roman Empire, physicians were doubtless still to be found, but they must have led very precarious lives and they certainly could not have had any leisure or opportunity for scientific work. In these earlier years of the Middle Ages the monks conducted the larger part of whatever medical practice was required in the districts in which the monasteries were located. In Byzantium, also, the outlook at this period of Roman history was very unfavorable; and nowhere else, as a matter of fact, would it have been possible for the casual observer to discover any signs that indicated the approach of a revival in the study of the sciences. And yet, even at that seemingly darkest moment in the history of medicine, there were forces at work which would soon revive these precious seeds of Greek knowledge, and, after transplanting them to a richer soil, cause them to produce even better fruit and in larger quantities than ever before.