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Dee, 21, 1883.] 413 [Allen, 
On a Case of Human Oongenital Malformation. By Harrison Allen, M. D+ 
(Read before the American Philosophical Society, December 21, 1883.) 
T desire to place upon record the facts in the case of a man born with 
rudiments.of the superior extremities. Similar cases, it is true, have been 
recorded, and in a sense, this history lacks the claim of a positive contri- 
bution to knowledge. But it is well to record each example of unusual 
conformation, when novel facts pertaining to the adult state, to habit and 
to acquired deformity, can be demonstrated. * 
The case is one of a group denominated Perobrachia and is embraced 
in the following account : 
John KE. Casey, aged sixty-four years, one of a family of seven well- 
formed children of healthy parentage was examined Noy., 1883. The 
subject was four fect and seven inches in height. In the place of the left 
superior extremity a small pedunculated lobule one inch in length was 
suspended from the axilla a short distance behind the group of axillary 
hairs. This lobule retained a slender rod of bone which could easily be 
determined, and which doubtless was homologous with the bones of the 
normal left superior extremity. 
The right superior extremity was a small unidigitate member, bent at 
the middle so as to resemble a letter I, and when at rest so disposed to 
the trunk as to correspond in length to the side of the thorax. 
The humerus was apparently dislocated upon the dorsum of the scapula 
onan outward extension of the glenoid cavity, and the bone was thus 
held in an exceptional relation to the seapula. The shaft of the humerus 
was bent at the distal third so as to present a convexity outward and 
yielded a short distance above the elbow to its lateral side, a small spine 
which while detected with ease, did not form an elevation of the skin. 
The position of the olecranon and that of the elbow-joint could be read. 
ily determined. The remaining portion of the extremity represented ele 
ments in a single axis excepting at the terminal phalanx. Within this 
axis the bones of the forearm, of the metacarpus, and the two phalanges 
of one digit could be identified. 
The bones of the left shoulder-girdle were small but complete. 
Of the right elements it was found that those of the shoulder. girdle were 
unusually well developed. Both scapulas were elevated, and the clavicles 
obliquely placed, the sternal ends determining the lowest, and the eleva- 
*A somewhat similar specimen to the one described is reported by Otto 
(Monstru. Tab, xvi, figs. 7,8, p. 188). The condition was symmetrical, the radius 
absent, and the single finger was identified as the fifth, since the ulnar nerve 
passed to it. The subject was an unviable female foetus, of the seventh month, 
Forster (Missbildungen) refers to several cases; references imperfect and not 
reliable, See also Anger (Nouveaux Hlements de VAnat. Chirurgicale, 578, 574). 
