430 BAYARD HOLMES 



Crawford, who was then about 60 years old, and in her own 

 house removed a large ovarian tumor. She recovered and 

 died in her 91st year, enjoying good health most of the time 

 after the operation. McDowell thought so little of his achieve- 

 ment that he neglected to publish it until eight years later, 

 when he reported three successful cases, and afterwards per- 

 formed at least ten similar operations. For one of these he had 

 agreed to operate for five hundred dollars, but the husband of 

 the patient on the morning of his departure gave him a check 

 upon one of the banks in Nashville, which McDowell supposed 

 to be for the stipulated sum. On presenting it he discovered 

 that it was drawn for fifteen hundred dollars. Presuming that 

 a mistake had been made, he immediately dispatched his ser- 

 vant to the gentleman, who replied that no mistake had oc- 

 curred, and that the services he had received from Dr. Mc- 

 Dowell more than counterbalanced the sum he had paid him. 



Ovariotomy as a procedure was rapidly established, and 

 with the assistance of anesthesia and antiseptic methods it has 

 become a safe and everyday procedure. The first ovariotomy 

 was performed in Germany in 1819, in England in 1836, and in 

 France in 1844. Many operators have reported a thousand 

 cases with a death rate of only three or four cases, and the 

 mammoth ovarian tumor of sixty to a hundred and fifty pounds 

 is now practically unknown in civilized countries. Inciden- 

 tally ovariotomy may be looked upon as the beginning of ab- 

 dominal surgery and of all of that pathology which has been 

 discovered in the course of abdominal section. The knowledge 

 of the living abdominal viscera in conditions of health and 

 disease became patent when ovariotomy had taught the sur- 

 geon the possibilities of abdominal section. 



John Collins Warren (1778-1856), of Boston, who first oper- 

 ated under ether narcosis, and in 1820, designed and practiced 

 the suture of harelip and cleft palate and made the existence 

 of an unfortunate class less miserable. He successfully per- 

 formed the first aspiration of the pericardial cavity. 



Reuben Dimond Mussey (1780-1866), professor of surgery 

 in Miami medical college, performed the first extirpation of the 

 whole upper extremity with the scapula and clavicle and tied 

 the carotid artery for the first time, for osteosarcoma. 



