100 LITERATURE OP THE ARABS. 



experiment. The most eminent of the Arabian 

 surgeons was Abulcasis, whose name has been al- 

 ready introduced. He complained of the deplorable 

 state into which the art had fallen in his day ; and 

 informs us that the Spanish practitioners dashed into 

 all kinds of operations without knowing in the least 

 degree the nature of the parts they were dividing, 

 and consequently without attending to the precau- 

 tions necessary for averting danger. His surgery is ar- 

 ranged into three books ; the first treating of caustics; 

 the second of surgical diseases ; and the third of luxa- 

 tions, together with some miscellaneous particulars. 

 Abulcasis is the only ancient writer on anatomy 

 that has described the instruments used in each par- 

 ticular operation. To him we owe the invention of 

 the probang, an elastic rod tipped with sponge, for 

 dislodging extraneous substances from the gullet. 

 Another instrument of his own, was that for ope- 

 rating in fistula lachrymalis, which he has explain- 

 ed, as also the needle used by the Oriental surgeons 

 for cataract. The knife, which he calls alnessil, 

 and used in the section of a vein, as distinct from 

 puncture, is by some presumed to be our common 

 lancet, a term which the French borrowed from 

 the ancient Gauls. The myrtle and olive knives, 

 so called from resembling in shape the leaves of 

 these plants, were employed for blood-letting by 

 incision. For opening veins in the forehead use 

 was made of the fosserium, said to resemble the 

 phleme for bleeding cattle, and which required per- 

 cussion to make it penetrate the skin. We learn 

 from Casiri, that among the Escurial manuscripts 

 there is a treatise in the Cufic character, which con- 

 tains a collection of plates of surgical instruments. 



