inflammation. When this defense is complete the abscess is walled in
so completely and with such thoroughness that all possibility of
intraperitoneal rupture rests with the blundering, heavy-handed,
trouble-hunting profession; and if nature _ever fails to complete
the building of this wall of defense it will be because she has been
interfered with by officious meddling in the name of scientific
healing._

There is no question but that many of these patients are seriously
handicapped and others positively killed by unskillful, overzealous,
superfluous examinations. A heavy-handed attendant should never be
allowed to manipulate swellings in the right iliac fossa, nor in any
other suspected region, for fear of destroying nature's defenses,
and possibly rupturing an abscess, the contents of which will be
emptied into the peritoneal cavity, causing peritonitis and death.

Seeds are seldom found in the appendix and the fear of swallowing
them because they may lodge in it is not well founded. There is no
question but that this organ has the power, when normal, of taking
care of itself. It has a peristaltic action and can expel anything
that is capable of gaining entrance.





CHAPTER V