118 [EMM. ~ 
sity of the female oeconomy, may probably be, 
as Mr. Hunter called it, by a process similar to 
that of a gland, but neither requiring, nor indeed 
receiving that degreee of refined secretion from 
common blood, which true glands perform. It is 
admitting as much as the peculiarities of the cata- 
menial blood require, and as the anatomical struc- 
ture of the orzan from which it is disgorged, 
permits. It is admitting rather more than for my 
own part 1 am willing to admit, while I have be- 
fore my mind’s eye, the general plethoric state of — 
the female constitution, immediately preceding 
this evacuation. In short, I must confess Cul- 
Jen’s opinion is not without some strong claims ; 
and, if Ido not yield absolute acquiescence in it, 
it is because my mind feans to a participatory 
union of some of the points of it, with some part 
of the idea of Hunter. 
The liability of the uterus to glandular diseases 
as scirrhus and cancer, is no proof as Dr. Chap- 
man infers it to be, that it is, or ought to be 
considered a gland: since the stomach, which is 
none, is liable to the same affections. The con- 
volutions of its large and thin coated arteries, 
may more reasonably be accounted for by the des- 
tined necessity of distension of the whole organ 
in pregnancy, and of its parts of course, than by 
assiguing to this structure a glandular office; 
nature would provide by this structure of the blood 
vessels a facility for such distension. The rigid- 
ity and narrowness of the veins by which the blood 
“returns with difficulty,’’ is also accounted for by 
the evident necessity of a considerable presence of 
blood in the viscus, to supply its demand during 
pregnancy; and since that state is not always pre- 
sent, in thesame individual, and not at all in the 
