DIAGNOSIS. 333 



the well-instructed physician. As women in their first child-birth 

 lack a term of comparison, they very frequently deceive themselves 

 in regard to the sensations they experience; even in the second, 

 third or fourth pregnancy women deceive themselves sometimes. 

 How often have the neighbors, relations, the widwife or accoucheur 

 been seen to fix and arrange every necessary preparation for the 

 birth of the child, and the supposed labor cease for a whole month 

 or six weeks, just when the bed had been made up for the reception 

 of the woman, and when the clouts, the ligature for the cord, the 

 scissors, the caps and other clothes of the child were only waiting 

 for the arrival of the stranger to be applied to it ! How often have 

 even still greater mistakes been committed ! Who does not know 

 how poor women have been kept for days together on the child-bed, 

 even by physicians, and at last found that their pregnancy was seve- 

 ral months ofi" from its close, or even that they were not pregnant at 

 all ! A young woman in her ninth pregnancy was seized with pain, 

 and thought herself at term; several accoucheurs were called in suc- 

 cession. One said that the bag of waters was formed; another, that 

 the head was about to engage; a third, that he could not find the os 

 uteri; a fourth, that the forceps must be applied. This poor creature, 

 in despair, sent for me on the fifteenth day; I found the cervix as it 

 is at the seventh month ; there was an anterior obliquity of the 

 womb; I stated that labor had not begun, and would not take place 

 for more than a month — and applied a broad bandage round the ab- 

 domen. In a month, a student, who staid by her, came to tell me 

 that the os uteri was dilated, and delivery about to take place. I re- 

 paired to her, found no symptom of labor, and in fact, the child was 

 not born till a month afterwards. 



When persons who are strangers to the science of medicine are 

 deceived in this way, the public only laugh at them; but what con- 

 fidence can an accoucheur inspire who is guilty of such stupidity? 

 It imports us therefore to be on our guard against such causes of 

 error, and it is easy for those who have any positive knowledge of 

 tokology to do so. 



801. The pains of labor, the true pains, are intermittent, sepa- 

 rated by intervals more or less short, progressive, return at regular 

 periods, are not accompanied with tenderness of the abdomen nor 

 heat of the skin nor fever; they begin in the neighborhood of the um- 

 bilicus, and end in the pelvis or flanks. 



Pains foreign to \2b0r, false pains, are, on the contrary, vague, 

 irregular, sometimes more, sometimes less acute, do not entirely 

 cease, increase under pressure, and are, most commonly, accom- 

 panied with fever or some kind of functional disturbance; they an- 



