d and
congested, as portrayed in Plate 1. The ulcer was much inflamed and
painful, the veins corded and deep colored, and there was a free
discharge of sanguineous yellowish matter. When the girl's general
health improved and menstruation became more natural, the vicarious
discharge diminished in proportion, and the ulcer healed shortly
afterward. Every month this breast had enlarged, the ulcer became
inflamed and discharged vicariously, continuing in this manner for a
few days, with all the accompanying menstrual symptoms, and then dried
up gradually. It was stated that the ulcer was the result of the girl's
stooping over some bushes to take an egg from a hen's nest, when the
point of a palmetto stuck in her breast and broke off. The ulcer
subsequently formed, and ultimately discharged a piece of palmetto.
This happened just at the time of the beginning of the menstrual epoch.
The accompanying figures, Plate 1, show the breast in the ordinary
state and at the time of the anomalous discharge.
Hancock relates an instance of menstruation from the left breast in a
large, otherwise healthy, Englishwoman of thirty-one, who one and a
half years after the birth of the youngest child (now ten years old)
commenced to have a discharge of fluid from the left breast three days
before the time of the regular period. As the fluid escaped from the
nipple it became changed in character, passing from a whitish to a
bloody and to a yellowish color respectively, and suddenly terminating
at the beginning of the real flow from the uterus, to reappear again at
the breast at the close of the flow, and then lasting two or three days
longer. Some pain of a lancinating type occurred in the breast at this
time. The patient first discovered her peculiar condition by a stain of
blood upon the night-gown on awakening in the morning, and this she
traced to the breast. From an examination it appeared that a neglected
lacerated cervix during the birth of the last child had given rise to
endometritis, and for a year the patient had suffered from severe
menorrhagia, for which she was subsequently treated. At this time the
menses became scanty, and then supervened the discharge of bloody fluid
from the left breast, as heretofore mentioned. The right breast
remained always entirely passive. A remarkable feature of the case was
that some escape of fluid occurred from the left breast during coitus.
As a possible means of throwing light on this subject it m
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