This article is only available in the PDF format. Download the PDF to view the article, as well as its associated figures and tables. SLENDER piercing foreign bodies of the esophagus are not uncommon, but those that penetrate and enter the structures of the neck are, fortunately, comparatively rare. Prior to the advent of chemotherapy, it was common to have these piercing foreign bodies create a mediastinitis. If the patient was to survive, either the abscess was entered through an esophagoscope or, if better surgical judgment was used, it was entered through a lateral exposure in the neck. Recently there have been two foreign bodies with which I am familiar that have buried themselves in the neck and have become walled off and inert. The case which is presented here is unusual in that the foreign body was a fine steel wire which did not remain isolated and which gradually worked its way through the tissues to present itself beneath the skin, where it was readily extracted. REPORT OF A CASE A boy aged