Mr. Shaw on the Facial Nerves. 135 



that all kinds of paralysis are produced by an affection of the 

 brain, imagine that the palsy of the face is only the precursor 

 of that more general attack, which will reduce them to the 

 most helpless condition. 



Several examples might also be offered, to shew that a 

 knowledge of the functions and of the distribution of the nerves 

 of the head, is not less important to the surgeon in planning 

 his operations for the removal of tumors, 4-c., from the face, 

 than it is to the physician, in detecting the causes of the different 

 kinds of paralysis. 



If a surgeon has an accurate knowledge of the small nerves 

 which pass from before the ear to the mouth and nostril, he 

 may, in extirpating tumors from the cheek, save those branches, 

 and thus avoid substituting distortion, for the deformity which 

 he wished to remove ; a result which has hitherto often fol- 

 lowed operations on the face, in consequence of our proceeding 

 on the old idea, that although the branches of the portio dura 

 were cut, still the part of the face to which they went, Would 

 be sufficiently supplied with nerves from the 5th pair. 



I need scarcely add, that if in this inquiry I have been able 

 to note certain important circumstances in the symptoms and 

 causes of various kinds of paralysis, which have been over' 

 looked by the many acute and learned men who have anxiously 

 and carefully investigated the subject, it has been in conse- 

 quence of my having been directed in my inquiries, by a know- 

 ledge of the minute observations on the anatomy of the nervous 

 system, and of the discoveries which have been lately made by 

 Mr. Charles Bell. 



The importance of the discussion is sufficiently proved by 

 the circumstance, that not less than eighteen cases of differ- 

 ent kinds of paralysis, the causes of which were hitherto but 

 very imperfectly understood, have come within my limited 

 opportunities of observation, in the course of the last twelve 

 months. 



Albany, March, 1822. Jojjn Sjiaw. 



