THE NERVE CELL AS A UNIT.^ 

 By Pierre A. Fish, D.Sc, D.V.S., 



Ithaca, New York. 

 With 7 Text-figures. 



The sciences of morphology and physiology, perhaps more 

 than any others, were of slow development. Their early years 

 were enshrouded in mysticism and magic. Progress was retarded 

 largely by theological opposition associated with superstition. 

 The ancients believed that the soul was slow in leaving the body 

 and that the latter should not, therefore, be used for dissection 

 at once. The period allotted for this migration of the soul, 

 left the body in anything but a fit state for investigation. This 

 opposition did not extend to chemistry and other sciences, 

 which, at that time, were in a flourishing condition. 



With the renaissance there came a renewed interest in anat- 

 omy, and in Italy it was decreed that one body should be dis- 

 sected annually at the universities. This, curiously enough, 

 was done by a barber's assistant with a razor. 



There was a time when it was the custom to administer to 

 the inner, as well as to the outer, ills of mankind. Barbers 

 were particularly adept at bleeding, and combined the science 

 of phlebotomy with that of shaving. To advertise this pro- 

 fession they erected signs in the form of poles wrapped around 

 with red and white bandages — the red to indicate the bleeding, 

 and the white, the soapy lather. We must, doubtless, look 

 upon our modern barber poles as heirlooms of this ancient and 

 honorable profession, deprived, to some extent, of their old 

 time significance. 



Because the sphere was accepted as the symbol of perfec- 

 tion by the ancients, Plato regarded the more or less globular 



' Read at the quarterly meeting of the Cayuga County Medical Society, 

 Auburn, N. Y., Feb. 10, 1898. 



