PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 



The object in view in the preparation of this volume was the selection and 

 presentation of the more important facts of physiology, in a form which it is 

 believed will be helpful to students and to practitioners of medicine. Inas- 

 much as the majority of students in a medical college are preparing for the 

 practical duties of professional life, such facts have been selected as will not 

 only elucidate the normal functions of the tissues and organs of the body, but 

 which will be of assistance in understanding their abnormal manifestations 

 as they present themselves in hospital and private work. Both in the selec- 

 tion of facts and in the method of presentation the author has been guided by 

 an experience gained during twenty years of active teaching. 



The description of physiologic apparatus and the methods of investiga- 

 tion, other than those having a clinical interest, have been largely excluded 

 from the text, for the reason that both are more appropriately considered in 

 works devoted to laboratory methods and laboratory instruction, and for the 

 further reason that the student receives this information while engaged in the 

 practical study of physiology in the laboratory, now an established feature 

 in the curriculum of the majority of medical colleges. For those who have 

 not had laboratory opportunities a brief account of some essential forms of 

 apparatus and the purposes for which they are intended will be found in an 

 appendix. 



I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to Professor Colin C. Stewart for 

 many valuable suggestions in the preparation of different sections of the 

 volume; to Dr. Carl Weiland for assistance in the chapter on vision; to Dr. 

 Joseph P. Bolton for excellent suggestions on questions relating to physiologic 

 chemistry. 



