NA TURE 



53 



THURSDAY, NOVEMBER i6, 1876 



FOSTER'S ''ELEMENTARY PHYSIOLOGY 

 A Course of Elementmy Practical Physiology. By M. 

 Foster, M.D., F.R.S., Fellow of and Prxlector in 

 Trinity College, Cambridge, assisted by J. N. Langley, 

 B.A., St. John's College, Cambridge. (London : Mac- 

 millan and Co., 1876.) 



I X this little book Dr. Foster gives us the results of his 

 .perience in teaching physiology practically to students. 

 AS may be readily understood, such teaching is attended 

 with much greater difficulties than those encountered in 

 the experimental teaching of chemistry or of physics- 

 difficulties which arise partly out of the complexity of the 

 phenomena to be demonstrated, partly from the circum- 

 stance that experiments in which living processes are 

 concerned cannot be repeated so frequently as would be 

 desirable. Dr. Foster has himself been remarkably suc- 

 cessful in overcoming these difficulties. The evidence of 

 that success is to be found in the number of men whose 

 names are already known as efficient workers in physi- 

 ology, who owe to his teaching their first introduction to 

 scientific research. On this ground, even more than on 

 tliat of his long experience as a teacher, his opinion on 

 the question of method is more worthy of attention than 

 that of any other person. The book is entitled "A Hand- 

 book of Practical Physiology." Our readers are probably 

 not aware that during the last half-dozen years that term 

 has acquired a special meaning. Under the term Practi- 

 cal Physiology all students of medicine are now required 

 by the examining Boards to go through a course of 

 laboratory instruction, for which accordingly arrange- 

 ments are made in all medical schools. In very many 

 instances the instruction is purely technical and anatomi- 

 cal. All that is attempted is to teach the student " how 

 to work with the microscope," which means for the most 

 part how to prepare tissues for microscopical examina- 

 tion. The acquirement of this art, although, it need not 

 be said, of great value to the physiologist, is not the end 

 and purpose of physiological teaching. The physiologist 

 interests himself only in what is living, and when he uses 

 the microscope, concerns himself with the anatomical 

 structure of a part or organ, only in relation to its living 

 properties. 



The handbook contains no description of the micro- 

 scope, and the subject of microscopical manipulation is 

 dealt with in an appendix. In this respect it differs from 

 most previously published works on histology. Never- 

 theless it is as good an introduction to that subject as the 

 beginner in animal physiology can take in hand. The 

 plan of study laid down is anatomical, but in carrying it 

 out, the principle is acted upon that it is desirable from 

 ae first to give meaning and interest to the otherwise dry 

 '-tails of anatomy, by combining the study of the func- 

 ion of every part with that of its structure. Histological 

 work, says Dr. Foster in his preface, " unless it be salted 

 with the salt either of physiological or of morphological 

 ideas, is apt to degenerate into a learned trifling of the 

 very worst description." To avoid this evil, of which the 

 feebleness of English microscopy is the best evidence. 

 Dr. Foster encourages the student, as soon as he has 

 Vol. XV.— No. 368 



learnt the anatomy and histology of a part, to pass at 

 once to its physiology, " so that by learning what is 

 known concerning its action, he may form an opinion of 

 the real importance of its structural details." 



Let us now see how the principle is carried out. The 

 book comprises twenty-nine lessons. The first is en- 

 titled, " Dissection of a Rabbit and of a Dog." The 

 purpose of this introductory lesson is to make the 

 student acquainted with the general construction of the 

 body of the mammalian animal as a whole, a sort of 

 knowledge which students of human anatomy are often 

 strangely wanting in. Then follow two lessons on the 

 blood. In the first, the student learns all that relates to 

 the structural elements of the circulating fluid ; but even 

 here the instruction given is of such a nature that he 

 cannot fail to be impressed, provided that he is capable 

 of being impressed by observation, with the fact that 

 he has to do, not with dead forms, but with living 

 organisms. In the second lesson on the blood, the chemi- 

 cal constituents of the liquor sanguinis are dealt with, 

 particularly those which are concerned in the process of 

 coagulation. Here necessarily, the microscope.and scalpel 

 are for the moment replaced by methods and instruments 

 borrowed from the chemical laboratory, but they are re- 

 sumed in lessons four and five for the study of cartilage, 

 bone, teeth, and the connective tissues. In the next series of 

 lessons on contractile tissues, structure and function are 

 again mixed. The student, as soon as he knows what 

 cilia and muscular fibres are like, at once proceeds to find 

 out for himself, though according to a prescribed order, 

 how they work. He familiarises himself in succession 

 with the effects of the voltaic current, of single induction 

 shocks, and faradization on living muscle, then pro- 

 ceeds to the more minute examination of the mechanical 

 phenomena of muscular contraction, and finally, as in 

 the previous study of the blood, investigates the same 

 phenomena in their chemical relations. 



In the same style and on the same principle each suc- 

 cessive subject is dealt with. "The animal body is 

 regarded," to quote the author's words, " as a collection 

 of fundamental tissues, each having a conspicuous pro- 

 perty or properties." 



Each lesson has appended to it a list of subjects for 

 demonstration by the teacher, these consisting either of 

 microscopical structures requiring very high powers for 

 their exhibition, or of experiments which the student would 

 be unable to perform for himself. Among these last only 

 such are comprised as are in their nature painless. 



There can be no doubt that the book is admirably 

 adapted for its immediate purpose, namely, for the instruc- 

 tion of natural science students at Cambridge. In order 

 to judge of its general utility the question must be asked 

 whether it is adapted to the requirements of the much 

 larger class of students who learn physiology with a view 

 to the study of medicine. 



The answer to this question must depend on the class 

 of medical students contemplated. Students of medicine 

 may be divided into three categories, the first comprising 

 those who come up with the avowed intention of acquir- 

 ing no more than the minimum of cram exacted of them 

 by the Examining Boards, and who at the end of their 

 time are as incompetent for practice as they are destitute 

 of knowledge. The second, and by far the largest class, 



