Becker and Obermayer

 
"A primary cutaneous nodule of melanoma is composed of melanoblastic cells which are of two types: the spindle-celled variety (sarcoma-type) as described for lentigo maligna and the round or oval variety (carcinoma-type). Section from an early lesion shows disruption of the epidermodermal junction with increase in number of melanoblastic cells in this region. During the early stage of the process the melanoblastic cells are confined to the superficial portion of the dermis and are limited internally by a moderate to extensive cellular infiltrate composed of lymphocytes and plasma cells. As the tumor enlarges, invasion of the deeper layers of the dermis takes place and the infiltrate decreases in amount. Of the two types of cells, the sarcoma type predominates in early lesions. The carcinoma type is usually seen later though occasionally early tumors may be composed of this type of cell from the beginning." (Fig. 1) Becker SW, Obermayer ME. Modern dermatology and syphilology. 2nd Edition. Philadelphia: JB Lippincott, 1947:709.

View Figure  		Fig. 1  Our diagnosis and comment: Melanoma. The "epithelial disintegration" is a consequence of poor laboratory technique, the "melanoblastic cells" are abnormal melanocytes, and the "round cell infiltration" is of lymphocytes.
 

Brief Critique

 
Nothing in these sentences enables a histopathologist to come to a specific diagnosis of melanoma. In fact, the authors do not set forth a single useful criterion for that diagnosis. Moreover, much of what is written is wrong, for example, notions of melanoblasts and melanocarcinoma, the former being a fiction and the latter a misconception; melanoma is a sarcoma, made up as it is of non-epithelial cells (melanocytes).