LESIONS OF THE PAROTID DUCT. 
279 
nion in veterinary medicine relative to wounds of the superior sali- 
vary canal, when a case of cure, related by M. Olivier*, appeared 
to modify in some degree the exclusive ideas of incurability chiefly 
patronized by M. Leblanc. 
This important surgical point, which, up to that time, had never 
been made the subject of controversy, could not fail of receiving 
the light which a wise and moderate critic always succeeds in 
throwing on the solution of every medical question. 
Certainly, the case narrated by M. Olivier was of a nature to 
convince the most sceptical person that wounds in the parotid duct 
were, if not always, at least in some cases, capable of being cica- 
trized. Well ! M. Leblanc, doubtless convinced of the beneficial 
results attendant upon complete extirpation of the parotid, does 
not hesitate to express a doubt respecting the cure obtained by 
M. Olivier, simply by patience and cleanliness; but not being able to 
contest the material point of the case, that is to say, the cicatrization 
of the external wound, which emitted the flow of saliva, explains 
to himself, by means of specious reasonings, that the parotid had 
lost the power of secreting by becoming atrophized ! a strange 
argument, which can have no value excepting in the eyes of those 
who approve of the substitution of speculative ideas for the prac- 
tical results of clinical study. 
However it may be with regard to this opinion, which we will 
examine at a more fitting time, M. Olivier’s case had the effect 
of creating a doubt in the minds of practitioners, and bringing the 
question to the fair tests of criticism and experiment. M. Leblanc first 
commenced a series of experiments, all of which, without exception, 
tended to confirm him in his pre-conceived opinion relative to the in- 
curability of fistulse of the parotid duct, The following is a short 
analysis of them, extracted from the “ Journal Pratique,” 1829, 30. 
On the 17th Oct. 1828, this veterinary surgeon excised about 
the third of an inch in the left salivary canal, and made a longitu- 
dinal incision of equal extent in the opposite one, at the point of its 
passage close to the maxillary tuberosity. 
After this double operation the saliva flowed abundantly. On 
the following day, the jet had much diminished : it was no more 
than a simple discharge, that increased when the horse ate oats. 
On the 1st of December, that is to say, forty-four days after the 
opening of the canals, the right wound, which had hitherto been 
pallid, began to cicatize ; the discharge of saliva ceased : a fistula 
O still, however, continued to exist on the left side, and the wound 
retained its pallid aspect. In the right duct, which had been ex- 
cised longitudinally, M. Leblanc remarked a clot or core, produced 
by the accumulation of the saliva in this conduit. 
* Journal Pratique, 1828, p, 401. 
