542 ON PARTURITION. 



of the male become visible, and in the female the horns of the 

 uterus appear. In truth, it is most marvellous to see what an 

 enormous quantity of semen is contained in full-grown moles 

 and mice at those times, whilst at others no semen can be seen, 

 and the testicles are shrunk and retracted. So also when 

 the reproductive faculty ceases in the female, the uterus is found 

 with difficulty, and it is scarcely possible to distinguish the sexes. 

 The uterus, especially in the woman, varies extraordinarily 

 as it is fecundated or not, both in constitution and in the 

 results of that constitution I mean in position, size, form, 

 colour, thickness, hardness, and density. In the girl, before 

 the age of puberty, the breasts are no larger than those of the 

 boy, and the uterus is a small, white, membranous organ, des- 

 titute of vessels, and not larger than the top of the thumb, or 

 a large bean. In like manner in old women, as the breasts 

 are collapsed, so is the uterus shrunken, flaccid, withered, pale, 

 and void of vessels and blood. I attribute the suppression of 

 the catamenia in elderly women to this cause; in them the 

 menstruous fluid either escapes as hemorrhoidal flux, or is pre- 

 maturely stopped, to the injury of the health. For when the 

 uterus becomes cold and almost lifeless, and all its vessels are 

 obliterated, the superfluous blood boils up, and either falls back 

 and stagnates, or else is diverted into the neighbouring veins. 

 On the contrary, in those pale virgins who labour under chronic 

 maladies, and in whom the uterus is small and the catamenia 

 stagnate, " by coition," says Aristotle, 1 " the excrementitious 

 menstrual fluid is drawn downwards, for the heated uterus 

 attracts the humours, and the passages are opened." In this 

 way their maladies are greatly lessened, seeing that want of 

 action on the part of the uterus exposes the body to various 

 ills. For the uterus is a most important organ, and brings the 

 whole body to sympathize with it. No one of the least expe- 

 rience can be ignorant what grievous symptoms arise when the 

 uterus either rises up or falls down, or is in any way put out of 

 place, or is seized with spasm how dreadful, then, are the mental 

 aberrations, the delirium, the melancholy, the paroxysms of 

 frenzy, as if the affected person were under the dominion of 

 spells, and all arising from unnatural states of the uterus. How 



1 De Gen. Anim. lib. iii, cap. 1. 



