1. It might be supposed that a work on diseases of the soft parts,
would be a more proper place for this article, than the present one,
where my express object is to treat of affections of the hard parts.
What induces me to insert it here is, the analogy which exists between
a division of the tendo Achillis and a fracture of the os calcis, the
light which the treatment of the one throws on that of the other, and
the example of the celebrated Petit, who, in his work on diseases of
the bones, speaks also of this division.
§ I.