THE EDITOR’S REPLY. 
345 
gamation with the blood, it still retains its colouring properties, and 
imparts these properties to the bone, which it renews ? In a certain 
disease, the name of which at present has escaped me, a new bone 
grows outside the old one, enclosing it as with a sheath. The success¬ 
ful practitioner removes the old bone, and the plastic new one soon 
takes the form, size, and place of the one removed, and the limb feels 
no want whatever. This is not mere expansion ; there is formation at 
work; and if, when holding the old bone of your limb in your hand, 
you felt you had got a better in its place, what theory would you 
adduce in explanation of such a phenomenon ? It is true that these 
are facts with which I am not personally acquainted; but were I to 
believe nothing except what I had ocular demonstration of, my belief 
and my knowledge would be limited indeed. Although they possess 
not the most direct, they still have a reference to the matters in hand, 
as one of your leading propositions is, that “ no fluids, such as the sap 
of plants, or the blood of animals, are capable of becoming organisable.” 
I do not assert that they are capable, but I admit the possibility. 
These remarks I submit to your consideration, and conclude with 
congratulating myself, that if in theory we slightly differ, in practice 
we so much agree; and really if it was not for the hope that others of 
my brethren, chiefly the young, might be induced to give the results of 
their observation, and thus mature a science which is only in its in¬ 
fancy, it would not be worth while discussing the subject, when, as yet, 
it must be left in a great measure as matter of opinion; either theory, 
like those respecting caloric, with a little circumlocution, being suffi¬ 
cient to explain the various phenomena which present themselves. 
Hyde Park Corner. ROBERT Fish. 
To Mr. Fish. —Dear Sir,—As we have only a few words of rejoinder 
to make to your foregoing reply, we think it better to place them toge¬ 
ther, than delay our remarks till the publication of another number of 
the Register. 
For your friendly commendation and compliments, accept our best 
thanks; and for any misconceptions we may have formed, in attribut¬ 
ing to yourself the reveries of others, we shall hope to be forgiven, 
because, as these reveries were the strongest batteries whence our 
own opinions were assailed, we, in self-defence, were compelled to turn 
our artillery against them ; and we only trust that we have not, by any 
random shot, hurt your feelings, or checked your reconnoissance in 
spying out our fenceless positions. 
Your so recent perusal of our little book rendered unnecessary a 
v repetition of our arguments therein used in support of our peculiar 
VOL. V. —NO. LXIII. Y Y 
