The modern treatment of fractures of the skull, which includes the uncovering of all suspicious areas suggesting depression or the projection of bony spiculæ toward the dura, the removal of fragments and foreign matter of every description, the arrest of hemorrhage, adequate provision for drainage, faithful observance of asepsis both in operating and dressing, with such attention to the general condition of a patient as may be requisite, is, in a word, the impression that Lister and his teaching have made upon the surgical work of pre-antiseptic days.
The results obtained before that time through the faithful and painstaking application of surgical principles, of which cleanliness as then understood was the corner-stone, are scarcely less astonishing than those of to-day, if just consideration is given the work prosecuted in ignorance of the existence of bacteria and their appalling ravages.
The confidence and boldness with which the surgeon may now undertake