Excerpt from Archives of Otology, Vol. 24 In the last volume of these Archives (p.337), Holmes gives a pretty complete sketch of the works relating to the artificial opening of the mastoid process without exposure of the tympanic cavity. His description of the more recent developments in the surgery of the middle ear, however, shows so many deficiencies, that we may perhaps be justified in seeking to make it more complete. The stimulus impelling us to extend and amplify the operative methods which we had been in the habit of employing upon the basis of Schwartze's publications, must certainly be attributed to Kuster, whose procedure was also taken up by v. Bergmann soon after Kuster's paper was published. Kuster in his essay upon "The Principles of Treating Suppurations in Cavities with Rigid Walls," etc, expressed his views as follows: "The method of operating proposed by Schwartze, although practised by most otologists, I cannot regard as satisfactory from a surgical point of view"; and again: "A rational surgical procedure must start from the principle of making a wide and thorough opening in the bone, removing everything that is diseased, and exposing the source of suppuration so freely that the pus cannot possibly meet with any obstacle to its exit." About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."