performed, and at a critical opportunity,
will often snatch the child from the grasp of death.

2516. There are few subjects on which mothers have often formed such
strong and mistaken opinions as on that of lancing an infant's gums,
some rather seeing their child go into fits--and by the unrelieved
irritation endangering inflammation of the brain, water on the head,
rickets, and other lingering affections--than permit the surgeon to
afford instant relief by cutting through the hard skin, which, like a
bladder over the stopper of a bottle, effectually confines the tooth to
the socket, and prevents it piercing the soft, spongy substance of the
gum. This prejudice is a great error, as we shall presently show; for,
so far from hurting the child, there is nothing that will so soon
convert an infant's tears into smiles as scarifying the gums in painful
teething; that is, if effectually done, and the skin of the tooth be
divided.

2517. Though teething is a natural function, and to an infant in perfect
health should be unproductive of pain, yet in general it is not only a
fertile cause of suffering, but often a source of alarm and danger; the
former, from irritation in the stomach and bowels, deranging the whole
economy of the system, and the latter, from coma and fits, that may
excite alarm in severe cases; and the danger, that eventuates in some
instances, from organic disease of the head or spinal marrow.

2518. We shall say nothing in this place of "rickets," or "water on the
head," which are frequent results of dental irritation, but proceed to
finish our remarks on the treatment of teething. Though strongly
advocating the lancing of the gums in teething, and when there are any
severe head-symptoms, yet it should never be needlessly done, or before
being satisfied that the tooth is fully formed, and is out of the
socket, and under the gum. When assured on these points, the gum should
be cut lengthwise, and from the top of the gum downwards to the tooth,
in an horizontal direction, thus----, and for about half an inch in
length. The operation is then to be repeated in a transverse direction,
cutting across the gum, in the centre of the first incision, and forming
a cross, thus +. The object of this double incision is to insure a
retraction of the cut parts, and leave an open way for the tooth to
start from--an advantage not to be obtained when only one incision is
made; for unless the tooth immediately follows the lanc