MR GOODSIR ON MUSKET-BULLETS FOUND IN THE TUSKS OF THE ELEPHANT. 99 



or that it can throw out ossific juice to produce cicatrices ; and leads us to believe 

 that CUVIER, in denying the possibility of the obliteration of a shot-hole, had 

 allowed himself to be deceived. All difficulties are got over, and contradictions 

 reconciled, by bearing in mind the different circumstances insisted upon in this 

 paper, namely, 



1. That a tusk is an endogenous as well as an exogenous organ. 



2. That the pulp forms irregular ivory round foreign bodies, and at wounds 

 on its surface. 



3. That the membrane of the follicle is an important agent in closing up the 

 holes produced by foreign bodies which penetrate a tusk through the socket. 



EXPLANATION OF PLATE I. 



Fig. 1. A portion of a section of a wounded tusk ; a cement ; 6 regular ivory deposited previous to the 



wound ; o irregular ivory deposited after the wound. 



Fig. 2. A diagram illustrative of the mode of connection between the Retzian tubes of the primary and 

 secondary regular ivory, and the cells and Retzian tubes of the different mosculating systems of the 

 irregular ivory, after inclosure of a ball ; a cement with its osseous corpuscles ; b primary regular 

 ivory with its Retzian tubes ; c the ball ; d the irregular ivory with its systems of tubes and cells ; 

 e secondary regular ivory. 



Fig. 3. A copper ball inclosed in a sphere of irregular ivory, on the surface of which are the orifices of 

 Haversian canals. Some of the orifices have closed, and present the appearance of irregular projec- 

 tions. The mass has begun to be attached to the regular ivory of the tusk, and would in time have 

 been inclosed in it. The ball must either have passed across from the opposite side of the tusk, 

 or must have sunk below the level of the hole by which it entered. 



Fig. 4. Section of a tusk across the cavity of which a ball has passed, and become inclosed in the ivory 

 of the wall opposite the hole by which it entered. The hole is filled with irregular ivory, coated ex- 

 ternally with cement. The cement over the ball has been disarranged by the shock. This section 

 proves that the track of a ball across the pulp is not necessarily ossified. 



Fig. 5. Section of a tusk across the base of which a spear-head has penetrated and remained in the 

 wound. The weapon has therefore been separated from the pulp by deposition of irregular ivory in 

 the form of a tube ; a cement ; b b irregular ivory deposited previous to the wound ; c c regular ivory 

 deposited after the wound ; d irregular ivory inclosing a vacant space e, the seat of an abscess or 

 sinus, and continuous with the cavity of /, a mass of irregular ivory (coated with regular ivory) in 

 the form of a tube surrounding the foreign body. As irregular ivory always contracts in drying, more 

 than any other kind of dental substance, that portion of the section marked g g has been bent out- 

 wards. 



Fig. 6. The same section viewed in profile ; a the broken shaft of the spear ; 6 an irregular mass of ce- 

 ment formed round the orifice of the wound by the membrane of the tusk follicle, and which would 

 have closed the wound had the weapon been removed. The wound inflicted has in this instance, as 

 in many others, stunted the growth of the tusk at c c, so as to render the part formed after the in- 

 jury narrower and weaker. 



Fig. 7. A longitudinal section of a tusk in which a gun-shot wound had terminated in abscess of the pulp ; 

 a a cement ; 6 6 regular ivory deposited before the injury ; c c regular ivory deposited after the in- 



