VOL. XLVI.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 623 



no particular place set apart for the lesser denominations of coins, weights, mea- 

 sures, &c. their instrument cannot be used in Europe, nor can it be so univer- 

 sally applied to arithmetic as this, in which provision is made for the different 

 divisions of an integer into parts. 



This instrument has the advantage of our digits in many cases. First, the 

 figures can be felt, so may be used by a blind man. If it had no other, this 

 alone would be sufficient to gain it attention. Another advantage is, that when 

 attained, this method is much swifter than by our digits, and less liable to mis- 

 takes: it is also less burdensome to the memory, in working the rules of arith- 

 metic; as, by our digits, being obliged to carry the tens in the mind from one 

 place to another, which are set down by the shwan-pan. One may work a whole 

 night, without confusing the head, or affecting the eyes in the least. 



It may be of great use to teach people the power of numbers ; also to examine 

 accounts by; for as the person will, by the shwan-pan,* work it a quite different 

 way, it will serve as if another person had gone through the account; if it 

 proves right with the written one, we may rest assured the work is true. It may 

 be a very pretty lure, to lead young people to apply their minds to numbers. 



A Proposal for Intirely Removing the only Real Defect in the Lateral Operation 

 for the Stone. By Mr. John Mudge,-^ Surgeon, Plymouth. N" 49I, p. 24. 



Though the lateral method of cutting for the stone is now almost universally 

 allowed to have greatly the advantage of any other hitherto discovered, yet it 



• The inventor produced one of these instruments before the Society, and worked several questions 

 in arithmetic on it. It much resembles the abacus of the ancients. C. M. — Orig. 



+ John Mudge, the author of this ingenious paper, was bom at Biddeford, in the county of 

 Devon, 1720, being the son of the Rev. Za'chariah Mudge, a pious and learned divine. On the 

 promotion of his father to the vicarage of St. Andrews, Plymouth, our author was articled to a sur- 

 geon there. In this line his talents were soon displayed on many occasions, which procured him the 

 friendship and patronage of the celebrated Dr. Huxham, who then practised as a physician in that 

 town. After returning to Plymouth, from walking the public hospitals in London, finding at that 

 period but few surgical operations of difficulty were performed westward of Exeter, he determined to 

 exhibit the character of his talents by some operations of consequence in the presence of the faculty. 

 He accordingly sought out and found a proper subject, in a man afflicted with the stone. This sub- 

 ject be persuaded, by the aid of pecuniary arguments, to submit to the operation of lithotomy. And 

 the patient was paid, cut, and cured. 



From this time, till 1784, when Mr. Mudge received a diploma as m. d. and began to practise as 

 a physician, he continued the profession of surgery, and with great success. With a capacious mind, 

 assisted by experience and sound observation, Mr. Mudge in the course of his life made several im- 

 provements in the art of surgery, in which line he was not more eminent than in that of physic. His 

 method of extracting the stone in the lateral operation, described above in these Transactions; as also 

 his two publications, one on the safety of inoculation, and the other on a certain and speedy cure for 

 a recent catarrhous cough, are proofs of his skill and philosophical judgment. HLs method of ope* 

 VOL. IX. 4 L 



