96 CULPEPER’s ENGLISH. PHYSICIAN, 
diately compaffes the former, and lies beneath it, whofe inner and hollow part it 
invelopes, extending itfelf according to the magnitude thereof : it is with fome dif- 
‘ ficulty feparated from the amnios, and ftrongly bears and unites the veffels to the 
placenta. That fide next to the child is fiooth and flippery ; the other fide is fixed 
immediately to the womb by the faid placenta, which is commonly on the upper and 
fore fide: it does not encompafs the whole child, being conftituted of an innumera- 
ble company of veins and arteries, between which, blood out of the veffels feem to be 
fhed. The placenta uteri, or womb-cake, (becaufe of its fhape,) is a round mafs of 
flefh, furnifhed with divers.veffels, through which the child receives its nutriment. 
Its fubftance feems to be conftituted of an infinite number of little fibres, with con- 
gealed blood interpofed. It has veins and arteries running through it from the um- 
bilical veflels, which are at length loft about the edges of the placenta, making won- 
derful contextures, and clofely knit to the fubftance thereof, being joined together 
by various anaftomofes, through which the blood in the child runs back out of the 
arteries into the veins. It is, firft, to be a fupport to the navel veffels under which 
it lies : fecondly, to prepare blood to nourifh. the child, as the true liver does in 
grown perfons. This blood it fucks out of the veins of the womb, and, preparing 
it for ule, fends it through the greater umbilical vein tothe liver of the child, that 
fo it may be carried to the heart, out of which it is fent by the arteries into the 
whole body of the child for nourifhment. : 
The umbilical or navel veffels, (fo called becaufe, the child being excluded, they 
are all found to centre in its navel,) are in number four, viz. one vein, two arte 
‘ries, and the urachus; all which are covered with one common membrane or coat, 
which both inclofes all thofe veffels, and diftinguifhes them one from another, that 
they might neither be entangled or broken. The navel vein, paffing through the 
two coats of the peritonzeum, is inferted into the liver by a cleft, going through the 
‘navel, fometimes fingle and fometimes double. It is about five feet anda half in 2 
length, being meafured to the placenta : it is varioufly rolled or twifted about, that — 
its leng might not prove troublefome: from the navel it goes over the breaft, 
from whence it is obliquely carried over the right and left fides of the throat and 
neck, turning itfelf back at the hinder part of the head, and fo over the middle of an 
the forehead to the placenta: fometimes alfo it encompafies the neck like 4 oye 
all which you are to underftand of the whole cord or navel-ftring, with the reft of | 
the veffels contained therein. Its ufe is to convey the maternal blood from the pla: : 
centa, through the navel, to the child, for its nourifhment. In this navel-ftring: 
there are knots tranfparent in the veins, but not in the arteries, which are nothing 
but amore thick and flefhy conftitution of the membrana carnofa in thofe ee 
2 
