THE FUNDAMENTAL importance of repair, in general, and of fibrogenesis, in particular, in a wide variety of pathological processes is generally conceded. While analysis of repair of cutaneous injuries is intrinsically interesting and of practical importance, study of the healing of such wounds has been and will no doubt continue to be widely used as a model of repair processes in general. Yet despite the notable increase in the literature on wound healing during the last decade, certain basic problems concerning repair in general, first noted during the 19th century, still remain unresolved. It is maintained here, that failure to resolve certain of these theoretical and practical problems is in large measure due to the fact that 19th century descriptions of the healing of cutaneous wounds seem to persist unquestioned in the literature. Even the temporal order of events in healing cutaneous incisions is presently stated by many authorities to