Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 August 1883 — Modern Dentistry. [ARTICLE]

Modern Dentistry.

“Not the slightest pain,” explained the old dentist, adjusting the hard wood gag that held the jaws of his victim apart to their wildest limit. “Does it hurt? Well, now, young man, filling teeth, as I do it, is like going to a matinee.” * Meanwhile he had strapped the culprit’s head back in his chair, had cut a small hole in a sheet of rubber, and, thrusting both his hands into the condemned’s meuth, had forced the afflicted tooth through the small aperture. “Gwaum!” “Yes, you have guessed the name. This is ‘the dam.’ So called by its inventor, who, poor cuss, never made a cent out of his idea. Luck of inventors, you know. It is a marvelously useful affair. I strap the top of the dam over your nose and eyes with this bridle, and I hang two weights to the bottom, so” —suiting the action to the words, the doomed man began to slowly asphyxiate. “It takes a little time to dry out the tooth. Everything takes time. But the luxury of it! Now I can work rapidly. There, steady. Hot? True enough. ” Mechanically, the old dentist wheeled a bright, lathe-like machine from a corner and began to manipulate it with one of his feet. As he tramped he chanted the following dirge to the forsaken : “The greatest single improvement in dentistry. With this power drill I can ream out the inside of a tooth in less time than it formerly took to open a cavity. Sometimes gets loose in the hands of novices. Never employ a young dentist, my friend. A patient of mine went to one of the practicing rooms in town and a scholar went to work at him with a power drill. Just then a classmate asked him for some tobacco, and he let go the drill long enough for it to explore the roof of the patient’s mouth and to perforate the palate. Used as I manage it, however —” Burr—whiz —bur-r-r! “Wagidbell! Off—o-o! Gooid!” savagely demanded the lost one, as the cold perspiration rolled down his neck. “Do not be alarmed; the bell did not ring. This is a beautiful bit of work. I am so close to the nerve that I can see the pink-colored fibers through the bone. Just think how comforting it is to know that the drill can’t break through ” The man in the chair fainted.—Philadelphia Times.