ITS SURGICAL AND MECHANICAL TREATMENT. 85 



hollo wness of the palate, he says : " Many times it 

 happenetli that a portion or part of the bone of the 

 palate being broken with the shot of a gun, or cor- 

 roded by the virulency of the Lues Venerea, falls away, 

 which makes the patients to whom this happeneth 

 that they cannot pronounce their words distinctly, 

 but obscurely and snuffling; therefore,! have thought 

 it a thing worthy the labour to show how it may 

 be helped by art. It must be done by filling the 

 cavity of the palate with a plate of silver or gold, a 

 little bigger than the cavity itself. (Plate VIII., Figs, 

 c, D, E.) But it must be as thick as a French crown, 

 and made like unto a dish in figure, and on the 

 upper side which shall be towards the brain, a little 

 sponge must be fastened, which, when it is moistened 

 with the moisture distilling from the brain, will 

 become more swollen and puffed up, so that it will 

 fill the concavity of the palate, that the artificial 

 palate cannot fall down but stand fast and firm, as 

 if it stood of itself. This is the true figure of those 

 instruments, whose certain use I have seen not by 

 once or twice, but by manifold trials in the battles 

 fought beyond the Alps." This author figures a 

 second plate, which is retained in its position by a 

 button, oblong in shape (Fig. f, c), which is attached 

 to one extremity of a screw, the other extremity of 

 which appears on the concave surface of the dish- 

 shaped plate (Fig. g, d). The long diameter of the 

 button is passed through the long diameter of the 

 fissure, and then by turning the head of the screw 



