248 THE FOETUS. 



hundred and ninety-fourth day, which gives a latitude of eighty-three 

 days. 



637. Thus, far from being fixed, the duration of pregnancy in 

 brutes is, on the contrary, extremely variable, and as the habits and 

 constitutions of women render them incomparably more liable to 

 impressions than any of the inferior species of animals, it is evident 

 they must be liable to the same irregularities. Besides, the follow- 

 ing proof taken in the human species, and admitting of no reply, is 

 related by M. Desormeaux. A lady, the mother of three children, 

 was seized with insanity in consequence of a severe fever, and all 

 the resources of hygiene and therapeutics had been exhausted upon 

 her case in vain; a physician thought that a new pregnancy might 

 perhaps restore her intellectual faculties. The husband consented 

 to note down in a register the day of each sexual union, which took 

 place only once every three months, so as not to interfere with any 

 still imperfect conception. Now, this lady who was watched by her 

 servants, and who was moreover endowed with very severe princi- 

 ples both of morality and religion, was not confined until the lapse 

 of nine months and a half. 



Being agitated anew in a celebrated cause before the house of 

 Lords, at London, in 1825 and 1826, this question was decided in 

 the affirmative; but the physicians did not agree upon a fixed term 

 which must be always admitted. Out of twenty-five who were ex- 

 amined, seventeen said that pregnancy terminates about the thirty- 

 ninth or fortieth week, or betwixt the two hundred and seventieth 

 and the two hundred and eightieth day; but some of them did not 

 consider the case of Elizabeth Adderly, the wife of lord Hyde 

 Gardner, who was brought to bed on the three hundred and eleventh 

 day, as impossible. Dr. Blundell mentioned one pregnancy of two 

 hundred and eighty-seven days. Dr. Merriman said he had seen 

 several of two hundred and eighty-five, and two hundred and eighty- 

 seven days; two or three of two hundred and ninety-six, one of 

 three hundred and three, and one of three hundred and nine days. 

 Dr. Dewees relates one where the woman was not delivered until 

 the two hundred and ninety-third day, &c. To these testimonials 

 I may add a case which fell under my own notice. A woman in 

 her fourth pregnancy computed that she was four months gone 

 when she came to my amphitheatre. I distinctly felt both the active 

 and passive motions of the foetus. Appearances of labor took 

 place at the end of the ninth month, were soon suspended, did not 

 return for thirty days, languished a whole week, so that in fact the 

 delivery did not take place until the three hundred and tenth day. 



