MENSTKUATION. 303 



it is not very uncommon for the menses to appear during 

 lactation. 



As we should naturally expect, from the connection be- 

 tween menstruation and ovulation, removal of the ovaries, 

 especially when this occurs before the age of puberty, usually 

 produces arrest of the menses. It is a well-known fact that 

 animals do not present the phenomena of heat after extirpa- 

 tion of the ovaries. Raciborski has quoted cases of this op- 

 eration in the human subject, in which the menses were ar- 

 rested ; l but this rule does not appear to be absolute, as Dr. 

 H. R. Storer reports at least one case, in which menstruation 

 continued with regularity for more than a year after removal 

 of both ovaries. 9 When a cow brings forth twins, one a 

 male and the other apparently a female, the latter is called a 

 free-martin, and generally has no ovaries. Hunter, in his 

 paper on the free-martin, gives a full description of this 

 anomalous animal, and states that it does not breed or show 

 any inclination for the bull. 3 In 1868, we had an opportu- 

 nity of examining the generative organs of a free-martin 



1 RACIBORSKI, De la puberte, Paris, 1844, p. 100. 



2 STORER, De la menstruation sans ovaires. Archives de physiologic, Paris, 

 1868, tome i., p. 376. Other cases of this kind are on record. 



As these pages are going through the press, we have received, from Prof. T. 

 G. Thomas, the following very interesting account of five operations in which 

 both ovaries were removed : 



" In reply to your note of to-day, I would state that I have extirpated both 

 ovaries in menstruating women five times, with the following results : 



" Case 1. (Heard from two years and eleven months after the operation.) 

 No symptoms of menstruation. 



" Case 2. (Heard from two and a half years after the operation.) No symp- 

 toms whatever of menstruation. 



" Case 3. (Not heard from.) 



" Case 4. (Heard from nearly six months after the operation.) Tip to the 

 present time this patient has manifested no symptoms whatever of menstrua- 

 tion, but now states jthat she has a bloody discharge from the vagina and all the 

 symptoms accompanying the menstrual function. 



" Case 6. (Heard from five and a half months after the operation). No 

 symptoms whatever of menstruation." 



8 HUNTER, Account of the Free Martin. Observations on certain Parts of the 

 Animal (Economy, London, 1792, p. 60. 

 150 



