8 president's address. 



very limited acquirements. The operations were 

 roughly performed, and the instruments in use 

 unsatisfactory in principle and rude in construction. 

 Those who practised as dentists were, for the most 

 part, uneducated men, and the removal of teeth 

 (the operation chiefly performed, in the country 

 especially) was consigned to the stalwart arm of the 

 village blacksmith, to the barber, or, at best, to the 

 indifferently educated surgeon. It must be ad- 

 mitted, however, that in the metropolis, at the 

 close of the last century, a few good practitioners 

 sprang up, some of whom, as qualified surgeons, 

 and some without any recognised qualification, 

 exercised the specialty with credit and success. 



In all periods of the histor}^ of surgery, there 

 have been men, holding the highest rank in their 

 time as surgeons and physiologists, who have 

 written fully on the subject of the teeth ; but it was 

 our great anatomist Hunter, whose work treats in 

 many respects so ably of the physiology, and enters 

 so minutely and with so much evidence of acute 

 observation, into the development of the teeth and 

 the phenomena of dentition, who first drew parti- 

 cular attention to the subject, and indirectly led to 

 the establishment of dental surgery as a special 

 branch of practice in this country. 



The increase in the number of dental prac- 

 titioners during the last twenty or thirty years has 

 been remarkable, and it is satisfactory to observe 

 that the standard of professional acquirements and 



