80 OF THE SEXUA.L ORGANS. 



from the anus. The septum which divides it is pretty often com- 

 posed either of a simple froenum, connate or accidental, situated 

 transversely, or parallel to its axis, near the vulva, or cervix, or 

 tov(^ards the middle of the canal; or, of a valvular fold, more or less 

 strong; or, of a real diaphragm. I have observed all these differ- 

 ences both in the living and dead subject. This septum may give 

 to the vagina the appearance of two united cylindrical canals, each 

 having a hymen, as occurred twice to Callisen and once to Eisen- 

 mann, or a single external opening, as noticed by Bartholin and Hal- 

 ler; sometimes it exists only above and below, and allows the two 

 vaginae to communicate with each other, about their middle or near 

 the neck; most frequently, as remarked by Majocchi, Bcehmer, 

 Cassan, &c., it does not reach to the vulva, and further, is in general 

 only the continuation of a similar disposition of the womb. 



202. If such observations were good for nothing but to satisfy an 

 idle curiosity, I should not have dwelt so long on them; but many 

 of them are closely concerned with the practice of tokology; others 

 explain several phenomena, of which it would be otherwise difficult 

 to give any account; sterility, several kinds of extra-uterine preg- 

 nancy, superfetation, retention of the menses, fecundation and de- 

 livery through the anus, and want of menstruation, are cases in 

 point. When the womb is double, if the woman becomes preg- 

 nant in one side only, and there are, meanwhile, two orifices, quite 

 separate from each other in the vagina, two different persons, al- 

 though equally learned, may establish a very different diagnosis, 

 even during labor. Two distinguished physicians, says Tiedemann, 

 met together to see a woman who supposed herself on the point of 

 lying in; having touched her, one declared that the neck was in a 

 natural state; the other found it dilated, and said that the head was 

 engaged. Another examination showed them that the neck was 

 double. M. West laid before the Academy of Medicine a nearly 

 similar case, collected at the 3Iaternite of Paris: at the commence- 

 ment of the labor one of the pupils not only thought that dilata- 

 tion had not begun, but that the neck was not quite effaced; the 

 other found it dilated nearly one inch; the woman having died in 

 labor, the post mortem examination showed the reason of this dif- 

 ference of opinion; the womb, which was double, terminated by a 

 double OS tincae in the vagina. 



203. If by imagining laws we could compel nature to obey them, 

 I should be content to say with Tiedemann and Meckel, that a ma- 

 jority of the irregular conformations of the genitalia are only in- 

 stances of a persistence of their primitive, but natural state of organ- 

 isation; that the uterus bicornis, for example, depends upon this, that 



