this
subject than the older ones. Richardson speaks of a woman falling down
a few weeks before her delivery. Her pelvis was roomy and the birth was
easy; but the infant was found to have extensive wounds on the back,
reaching from the 3d dorsal vertebra across the scapula, along the back
of the humerus, to within a short distance of the elbow. Part of these
wounds were cicatrized and part still granulating, which shows that the
process of reparation is as active in utero as elsewhere.

Injuries about the genitalia would naturally be expected to exercise
some active influence on the uterine contents; but there are many
instances reported in which the escape of injury is marvelous. Gibb
speaks of a woman, about eight months pregnant, who fell across a
chair, lacerating her genitals and causing an escape of liquor amnii.
There was regeneration of this fluid and delivery beyond term. The
labor was tedious and took place two and a half months after the
accident. The mother and the female child did well. Purcell reports
death in a pregnant woman from contused wound of the vulva. Morland
relates an instance of a woman in the fifth month of her second
pregnancy, who fell on the roof of a woodshed by slipping from one of
the steps by which she ascended to the roof, in the act of hanging out
some clothes to dry. She suffered a wound on the internal surface of
the left nympha 1 1/2 inch long and 1/2 inch deep. She had lost about
three quarts of blood, and had applied ashes to the vagina to stop the
bleeding. She made a recovery by the twelfth day, and the fetal sounds
were plainly audible. Cullingworth speaks of a woman who, during a
quarrel with her husband, was pushed away and fell between two chairs,
knocking one of them over, and causing a trivial wound one inch long in
the vagina, close to the entrance. She screamed, there was a gush of
blood, and she soon died. The uterus contained a fetus three or four
months old, with the membranes intact, the maternal death being due to
the varicosity of the pregnant pudenda, the slight injury being
sufficient to produce fatal hemorrhage. Carhart describes the case of a
pregnant woman, who, while in the stooping position, milking a cow, was
impaled through the vagina by another cow. The child was born seven
days later, with its skull crushed by the cow's horn. The horn had
entered the vagina, carrying the clothing with it.

There are some marvelous cases of recovery and noninterferenc