CONSERVATION AND CORRELATION OF VITAL FORCE. 337 
Quoting again from the same author we are told: —* Hy- 
pertrophy of the brain is associated with rachitis, and stunted 
growth.”* Under rachitis, he informs us that, ‘while in the 
first and second stages, there is an arrest of ossification and a 
deficiency of calcareous salts in the system, there is often in the 
third stage, as Lebert has stated, an exuberance of ossification 
and a superabundant deposit of the salts of lime, so that the re- 
constructed bone is stronger and firmer than the normal bone.”+ 
Here then it would seem as though the compensation might 
extend over different intervals of time, one period being marked 
by a plus quantity, another by a minus:—a happy illustration 
of what John Hunter called the “body’s memory.” For this we 
are not entirely unprepared. The “stale” condition of overtrained 
pugilists is as much due, after all (some things lead us to sup- 
pose), to an excessive demand on their vitality as to subsequent 
dissipation ; and the early break down of so many of our best col- 
lege gymnasts is but another fact in the same category. Overdraw 
your bank deposit at one time and you are left a debtor at another. 
Failure of the long bones to properly develop in their longitu- 
dinal direction under certain conditions of disease is connected 
With undue thickening of the same bone. 
Turning now to the domain of surgery proper :— it is ere 
that the vast majority of new growths will be found to occur in 
advanced age, or at least after the “prime of life.” I exclude 
Ovarian tumors for manifest reasons. 
So commonly do we find scirrhus tumors of the breast asso- 
ciated with declining years, that age is always made an element 
of the diagnosis. The testimony of Paget on this point is most 
explicit. His table of the frequency of cancer at the different 
periods of life is 
Under 10 years. . . a ah 5 
Between 10 and 20 years Siew oO aneurin 
20 “ 30 ` 
s; nop erg ie oth ae 
po ee ie ee re 
ee 6AM BD 3 ao so er beg a a 
is BO; Ho. 60. Hii old eee 
BEBO IO he i gga a ee 
Eo yo a) GO Te poe ee le eee 
ar, ne tants CS Cues a 
* Op. Cit., p. 374. + Idem, ~~ 98 and 99. i Sa p. 798. 
AMER. NATURALIST, VOL. 
