THE EAR AND IT’S WONDERS.

The External Ear. – the organ of hearing consists of three parts: the external ear, the middle ear or tympanum, and the internal ear or a labyrinth. The external part of the air represented in the colored engraving is very realistic of that essential appendage to this important special organ of sense and man. It consists of an expanded sheet of cartilage, folded and true trumpet fashion, for collecting the sound waves in conveying them to the external meatus or mouth of the auditory canal.

It probably took me about 4 tries to get my voice recognition program to pick up on the word tympanum and get it spelled correctly!  That software has been one of my best buys ever, but it still makes mistakes on weird words from time to time.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• Walls of the Abdomen
  
  

  Walls of the Abdomen.  — The muscular walls of the abdomen are nicely arranged and beautifully adapted to the functions they perform.  On the left side we see the large oblique muscle, so named because of the direction it’s fibres run, and on the right side we observe the rectus muscle, transverse muscle and internal oblique muscle, all of which are strong, broad muscles, will split manner in which they are so scientifically arranged gives additional string to the abdominal walls, without deteriorating from its great mobility, and at the same time avoiding all pressure of the organs contained within this large cavity.  There are ninety-one muscles on each side of the trunk, or one hundred and eighty-two in all, ninety of which are pairs, and two are single.

  I noted a slight difference in spelling for the word “fibres” in the section.  I’m not certain if this is a medical spelling or if it’s just a difference in spelling that’s evolved over the last 90 years.  In addition the section also has a reference again to the beauty and perfection of design which doesn’t overdo it too much in this particular paragraph but given the history of the book so far seems to have more of a enthralled tone than you might expect.

• Beauty and Strength of the Foot
  
  

  Beauty and Strength of the Foot. — not only does the foot, too, frequently sustain heavy weights, but it must carry them as well. It likewise affords a firm support. Were it not for this beautiful mechanism, the constant jarring a concussion which would be experienced in the act of walking would inevitably destroy these delicate organs, the brain and spinal cord, and death would immediately follow. How few persons and civilized nations have perfectly natural feat! The beauty and utility of the human foot is marred; its movements are impeded by encasement and unnatural boots and shoes; these, instead of conforming to the form and shape of the foot, make the foot of death itself to them. The consequences corns, bunions, cross toes, in-growing toenails, large joints, and a number of other evils from which so many suffer the present day.

  And that sections ends another section of non-sense.  I am looking forward to the further sections of the book that actually conveys some knowledge.  You couldn’t find useful information in this section of the book with a GPS device.

• View of the Eye
  
  

  The next section covers The View of the Eye on page 36.

  The next section goes into a short description of the image of the eye as provider from a profile of a human skull which includes some of the muscles and nerves associated with the eyeball. It does not include a detailed description were drawing of the actual eyeball other than its contractual dry within that cross-section including the rest of the head.

  View of the Eye — We can likewise view the human eye as it lays in position in its bony socket, and wonder at our creators munificence and benevolence in providing us with such a delicate instrument of vision with which to light our way about in the world, and view the magnificent beauties of nature that surround us on every hand. Here, too, we observe the teeth, those essential prerequisites to personal beauty, and.able adjuncts to the powers of articulation and speech, protruding through the gums, their roots being visible above and below the gums; and the lower set we see the dental nerve distributing its nervous supply to their individual and collective roots.

  There are a couple things that stand out in this one simple paragraph.

  1. This book is written essentially by a collection of editors, that seemed to have taken information from many other oaks and sources over the years. As the book was written initially in the 1860s and updated throughout the next 50 odd years it’s possible that copyrights and copying or even citing sources were not as necessary at the time. So it’s difficult to tell who the original source of any of this information might have been other than the collective thank you at the beginning of the book. With all that said, it strikes me as odd that the editors would stray from the stated topic of “the eye” and move into a short discussion of the teeth within the same paragraph.
  2. Often the book has already mentioned references to God, as the book was written at the turn of the century closing out the Victorian era, I assume that they are referring to the Christian God. I actually have few doubts about that. However it is illustrative of the fact that this particular book was written in a way that was not secular in nature. I suspect we will see many additional references throughout the book as time goes on and I’m withholding further views on the subject until I have a more complete picture of what the true views of the “editors” might be as they manifest in the edited writing.