COMMUNICATIONS AND EXTRACTS. 75 



with protracted, unappeasable torture, and painful, lin- 

 gering death/' 



In May, 1848, he consulted the surgical staff of Lon- 

 don, from Sir Benjajnin Brodie downwards, who tried to 

 dissuade him from an operation ; so that he returned to 

 Scotland. 



In July, 1848, the ulcerated surface was the size of a 

 five-shilling piece, and soon afterwards a lymphatic gland 

 appeared enlarged on the right side of *his neck. On the 

 las<;giay of August, 1848, he prevailed on a dexterous 

 operator to excise it, which was accordingly done 

 most scientifically. In a week, trifling bleeding super- 

 vened. 



Professor Bennet, of this University, a most profound 

 physiologist, examined the excised portion of the tongue, 

 and thus remarks : 



" I took the utmost pains to make out all the facts 

 connected with the structure of this lesion ; and it will 

 be seen, on comparing the figures representing it with 

 those illustrating the formation of cancerous growths, 

 that they differ materially. In this, as in most other 

 cases of epithelial ulceration, the disease commenced at 

 the surface, producing increased formation of epithelial 

 cells, and great thickening and induration by their con- 

 densation. A true cancer always commences below the 

 epithelium, in the form«f a white deposit, which soon 

 appears as a nodule, and by its pressure subsequently 

 causes ulceration through the mucous coat. A thin slice 

 of the hardened schirrus-looking matter presented a very 

 different appearance from that observed in similar slices 

 removed from cancerous growths, and exhibiting nothing 



