448 Proceedings of the Ohio State Academy of Science 



some way. "The following matter seems worthy of consid- 

 eration, the reason namely, why veins when ligatured swell 

 on the far side and not on the near side of the ligature. But 

 exactly the contrary ought to happen if the movement of the 

 hlood and the spirits took place in the direction from the 

 viscera to all parts of the body. When a channel is interrupt- 

 ed, the flow beyond the interruption ceases; the swelling of 

 the veins therefore ought to be on the near side of the liga- 

 ture." The ebb and flow of the blood in the veins was a com- 

 mon belief by all until the time of Caesalpinus and there is no 

 doubt that in setting forth his ideas he broke loose from the 

 old Galenic beliefs, but knowing the temperament of the man 

 and the spirit that prevails in all of his work, the question 

 arises, how much of all this is due to his personal research or 

 how much was the result of his spirit of controversy? In 

 noting the little influence he and his ideas had on his con- 

 temporaries I am inclined to think that he knew very little 

 about what he was writing from actual experience, but his 

 ideas were the result of a very lucky hit in forming philosopi- 

 cal theories. Hieronymus Fabricius was the great contem- 

 porary of Caesalpinus and the one to add the next great step 

 in the knowledge of the circulation of the blood. 



Fabricius was born in Tuscany in 1537. During his early 

 life he was hampered considerably by lack of means and op- 

 portunity, but we find him studying medicine at Padua under 

 Fallopius, upon whose death he became the professor of 

 anatomy in which capacity he remained for 40 years. He 

 died at the age of 82 in the year 1619. He was well versed in 

 all the knowledge of the biologic sciences of his time, writing 

 many books on various subjects but the most important one 

 of interest to this paper is the one on the valves of the veins, 

 DeVenorum Osteolis "the little doors of the veins," which he 

 published in 1574. These valves had been noticed some years 

 1)efore but he was the first on to carefully work them out. 

 In his work he illustrated the-ii with fairly good figures and 

 crives the method of demonstrating them on the living speci- 



