To the Editor.—
In describing myelocele more than two centuries ago, Morgagni stated that these "watery tumors" of the vertebrae result from the pressure of fluid descending from the hydrocephalic head through the tube of the spine where it presses the bones asunder. Von Recklinghausen in 1886 examined the lesion with his microscope and found it to be an open neural tube. Therefore, he concluded that it resulted from failure of the neural tube to close. Since then, his theory has been almost uniformly accepted. Most teratologists have based their studies on this concept, despite the fact that increasing evidence has accumulated to sustain Morgagni's earlier concept. One needs only to read Weed's (1917) Development of the Cerebrospinal Fluid Spaces in Pig and Man to find the explanation for each and everyone of the so-called "dysraphic states." This brilliant and now almost unobtainable classic should be republished.The brain originates