THE TEETH. 97 



as long as it is useful, but no longer. When a tooth has 

 ceased to be good for mastication or for ornament, the sooner 

 it is removed the better. When removed, an artificial tooth 

 should be established in its place. The time has gone by for 

 natural-artificial teeth to have preference ; and the consider- 

 ation of this fact should do away with the hesitation that some 

 people have for using false teeth. Sentiment is a very power- 

 ful influence in this world. Keason about it as we like, sen- 

 timent is a feeling that must and will be respected. But for 

 sentiment, the utilitarianism of life might attain to a wider 

 development. We might eat cat's-meat to make flesh and 

 blood ; we might convert our dead into smelling-salts, prus- 

 sian-blue, lucifer-matches, skin door-mats, gloves, boots and 

 shoes, and perhaps a hundred other useful products. Senti- 

 ment restrains us even the most philosophical ; and the sen- 

 timent against fixing the teeth of dead human beings in the 

 mouths of living ones is undoubtedly potent. There is now 

 no need for doing this, so many excellent materials of non- 

 human origin standing in aid. Taken all in all, artificial teeth 

 of hard enamel are chiefly to be recommended, and those of 

 American manufacture are the very best known. The par- 

 ticular sort of teeth, however, will depend a good deal on the 

 shape of the palate and the number to be set in a block. Ex- 

 cellent sets are made of hippopotamus ivory; that of the 

 elephant is too soft, and stains too rapidly, to be of any great 

 use to the dentist. As a matter of sentiment, the advantages 

 of enamel or porcelain teeth, as we may call them, need no 

 expatiation. Being wholly non-absorbent, they never stain 

 or otherwise change colour. This leads up to an observation 

 and a precept ; one that wearers of this sort of artificial teeth 

 should more frequently remember than they do. It is this 

 natural teeth are never white. Except sometimes in early 

 childhood they have not the faintest claim to w r hiteness. A 

 miniature-painter, or others having a discriminating eye for 

 colour, would not fail to discover in by far the majority of 



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