New Lamps for Old

The fascination of old instruments is a pleasure that may not be shared byeverybody, but all urologists before inventing new instruments should have a knowledge of the development of their present equipment. Our forebears had many good ideas and some of their instruments are things of beauty in their own right. The earliest attempt at cystoscopy was by Bozzini in 1806 when, in a room that exists today virtually unchanged, he demonstrated his Lichtleiter. This instrument, made of silver and protected with shark skin, is at present in the museum of the College of Surgeons in Chicago (Fig 1). The light was a beeswax candle spring-loaded to keep the flame steady, with a silver mirror to reflect the light down the examining tube. The examiner looked past the mirror from behind the instrument. Various attachments allowed inspection of the vulva, the urethra, the rectum, the female bladder and the upper air passages. One of the attachments included a fitting for rightangle observation. Segelas, and Fisher of Boston both suggested endoscopes but none has been preserved. In 1865 Desormeaux of Paris described his endoscope with a lamp burning terebinth, alcohol and paraffin. The examining portions were designed for urethroscopy and proctoscopy. The light was reflected by a mirror down the tube and the examination carried out by observation through a small hole in the centre of the mirror. Two specimens of this instrument have