Ixxviii Journal of Comparative Neurology. 



stretching. The investigations of Valentine and notably Schleich, 

 confirmed by Tutscheke, Vogt, Laborde and Brown Sequard, showed 

 that sensibility is exalted by a slight elongation, but diminished when 

 the traction is more violent. Conrad demonstrated that the motor 

 fibres preserve their function after stretching, and Quinquand observed 

 the process of nervous transference after the operation. These labors 

 in experimental physiology were long in being applied clinically, till 

 Nussbaum, in 1872, performed the operation to combat a traumatic 

 contraction of the left arm and of the adjacent parts of the thorax. 

 By stretching of the last cervical nerve the affection was definitely 

 cured and the lost sensibihty of the affected region restored. The 

 operation was not wholly empirical for in i860, during resection of 

 the elbow, his assistant accidentally stretched the cubital nerve causing 

 a removal of convulsions which had existed in the muscles supplied 

 by it. 



In 1874 P. Vogt performed the operation by the non-surgical 

 method for ischiatic neuralgia resulting in recovery. Afterwards the 

 same operation was performed by Czerny, Kiister, Quinquand, and 

 others, in sciatic neuralgia and by Polaion, Ledentu and Badal, in 

 neuralgia of the trigeminus, especially of the nasal branch. Lagem- 

 buck employed nerve stretching to combat the lightning pains of 

 ataxia and was followed by Leyden, Nocht and Gussenbaur. 



Meanwhile the success attained by Nussbaum, in his first opera- 

 tion, in a case of contraction, indicated the employment of distention 

 whenever there existed functional disorder of the motor fibres : the 

 lengthening of the facial in tic doloreux of the face gave very good 

 results to Baum, Southam and Gray ; in case of tetanus Verneuill, 

 Clarke and Smith believe that they have obtained successes ; some 

 cases are cited of peripheral paralysis cured by elongation ; and in the 

 midst of their enthusiasm some go so far as to declare cases of the 

 cure of lepra anesthesica, an infirmity essentially microbian which can 

 not be modified by that operation. Declarations of this sort bring 

 into discredit an operation that is indicated in certain infirmities of tiie 

 nervous system and especially in cases of neuritis and neuralgia. 



The operation, ordinarily very simple, has much analogy to ligat- 

 ing arteries and is composed of three stages : 



1. The incision ot the soft parts until the nerve is exposed. 



2. The isolation of the latter, and 



3. Its lengthening. 



The incision must be made, whenever it is possible, parallel to the 

 direction of the nerve in order to facilitate the lengthening and to 



