The Rhode Island Republican

From the Montreal Herald.

Important improvement in Surgery.

The formidable operation of Lithotomy (or the extraction of Urinary Calculi) is now reduced to a degree of simplicity, almost incredible, by an invention of W. W. Stiles, Esq. M. R. C. S. L. and Lecturer in this city on Anatomy, Physiology and Surgery. We omit mentioning particulars, except the following prominent features in it, viz: that the skin is not touched with a knife; that the actual operation does not occupy the eighth of a minute; and that it is attended with little, if any, more danger or pain than bleeding at the arm. This operation considered by the most celebrated men of the day, as one fraught with the most imminent peril, and excruciating suffering will be rendered as simple as venesection. We further learn, that the operation as originally conceived by him, was liable to many difficulties, all which have been effectually obviated by certain measures devised by him during the last twelve months consideration of the subject, and without which it cannot be undertaken with safety. The Doctor, as might be anticipated, has as yet communicated these means to no one; but a treatise will shortly be published in London, to which city we understand, he proposes in the course of next summer, proceeding.

We have seen a stone the doctor extracted on the 18th inst. it weighs (independently of numerous fragments) seven hundred and ninety-eight grains; and its circumference, measured in two opposite directions each way, five inches. The patient was well on the third day.