24 SPRING-TIME SURGERY 



Practically, when an operator must insert his 

 entire hand into the abdominal cavity in his search 

 for the testicle, it is the operator, and not the tes- 

 icle, which is lost, with often a far too poor pros- 

 pect of finding himself and recognizing the defi- 

 nitely located and attached organ. 



Too many operators, and especially beginners, 

 search for, and attempt to identify the testicle, 

 without considering the relations to the gland of 

 the gubernaculum and vas deferens. Searching 

 independently of these for the gland is like a 

 shore fisherman on a dark night, who has securely 

 hooked and landed a fish in the darkness, and 

 starts groping about to find it, instead of follow- 

 ing his pole to the line, and thence along the line 

 to the hook, where the fish is definitely fixed and 

 located. So, in castrating a cryptorchid, the tes- 

 ticle need not be "found" in the common mean- 

 ing of the word, because it is not "lost," for the 

 epididymis and vas deferens are definitely and 

 closely moored at the posterior commissure of the 

 internal ring by the gubernaculum and at the 

 proximal end of the epididymis, securely fixed, is 

 the gland itself. 



