Lithiasis. 409 



of the Jura limestone, by the boundaries of which its pre- 

 valence is sharply defined, and, 4. In Dalmatia, whose moun- 

 tains belong to the Jura or Chalk formations. Regarding 

 Italy in which calculus is so common, we want sufficient in- 

 formation. But we know of Upper Italy, that it is very 

 rare in some granitic districts, as in Sondrio, and very com- 

 mon in some limestone ones, as in Cremona. The Mauritius is 

 no exception to this general rule, as, although its mountains 

 are volcanic, it is, like all volcanic islands, surrounded with a 

 girdle of coralline limestone, on which the towns are built. 



Hence it happens, that almost all the calculi of the patholo- 

 gical Museums of St. Petersburg, of Moscow, and Charkow, 

 have been obtained from patients sent in from the province 

 of Kursk, in which only calcareous rocks are found : and we 

 can thus understand how a living surgeon, Dr. Hildebrand, 

 has practised the operation of lithotomy with his own hands 

 as often as two thousand times in one hospital in Moscow. 



In the muschel kalk (of the new sandstone group,) and 

 in dolomite, upon which goitre is so common, calculus is less 

 frequent. 



According to V. Walther, the cause of lithiasis is the pro- 

 duction by the system of a fluid of a very binding nature, 

 and bearing nearly the same relation to calculus, that gelatine 

 does to bone. Stark, in his general pathology, has pointed 

 out by reference to comparative anatomy, the relation that 

 exists between the kidneys and the osseous system. The 

 more imperfectly the osseous system is developed, the larger 

 are the kidneys, or in other words, the kidneys are the con- 

 verse of the osseous system. In the latter, the salts of lime 

 and of phosphorus are deposited in a solid form : the former 

 excrete them in a fluid state. 



In the system of every animal we observe a most strongly 

 marked antagonism between the expressions of the universal 

 and of the individual life, between the formation of hard and 

 of soft parts, between the development of the skeleton 



