CORPUS LTJTEUM. 



311 



the corpora lutea disappear, it is nevertheless not without ex- 

 amples that they disappear much more promptly. I have 

 had the opportunity of examining the body of a woman, dead 

 in the course of the eighth month of pregnancy, in whom 

 the absorption was already complete. Facts of this kind are 

 doubtless very rare, as only one has occurred in my observa- 

 tions, notwithstanding the numerous researches to which I 

 have devoted myself for a long time. . . . 



" There exists a notable difference between the corpora 

 lutea which are formed as the sequence of conception, and 

 those which occur aside from the conditions developed by im- 

 pregnation. The duration of the former is much longer than 

 that of the latter, and the volume becomes, also, much more 

 considerable, although their nature is, in truth, identical. I 

 have too often had occasion to remark this, in the ovaries of 

 suicides, to retain the slightest doubt in this regard." * 



The preceding table, also quoted from Coste (op. cit., p. 

 256), shows the different stages of the corpus luteum of preg- 



1 COSTE, Developpement des corps organises, Paris, 1847, tome i., pp. 254, 257. 



