RETENTION OF THE FCETAL ENVELOPES. 567 



BOOK IV. 



ACCIDENTS INCIDENTAL TO PARTURITION. 



The accidents incidental to the act of parturition are rather diverse, and 

 not unfrequently complicate those difficulties already alluded to as hin- 

 dering natural birth. These accidents may occur either during par- 

 turition, immediately after delivery, or within a few days subsequent to 

 that event. 



In addition to the accidents, there are diseases which appear during the 

 puerperal period : though the distinction between them and the former is 

 not always easy to establish. 



Some of the complications just alluded to may succeed a perfectly nor- 

 mal delivery, or an accidental abortion, as well as a difficult birth. 



The accidents consecutive to or accompanying parturition, may be enu- 

 merated as follows : (i) Retention of the foetal etivelopes in the uterus and 

 the consequefices ; (2) Post-partum hce7norrhage from the genital organs ; (3) 

 Displacement or hernia of one or fnore of the i?iternal genital organs through 

 the vulva ; (4) Trau?natic lesions of the ge?iital or neighboring orgafis. 



Some of these accidents are either very serious in themselves or in 

 their consequences, and require the greatest skill to remedy \ or they are 

 comparatively trifling, and easily repaired. 



CHAPTER I. 



Retention of the Fcetal Envelopes. 



The retention or the foetal envelopes, placenta, " secundines," or " after- 

 birth," beyond a certain time after the expulsion of the foetus from the 

 uterus, must be looked upon as an accidental or pathological condition 

 which requires attention. We have already shown that the placenta is 

 usually shed or expelled soon after the young creature is born, and par- 

 ticularly with such animals as the Mare, Sow, and Bitch, the placenta of 

 which is diffused or zonular ; indeed, with multiparous animals — as the 

 two latter — the placenta of each foetus is extruded soon after its birth 

 by the succeeding foetus ; so that, if retention occurs at all, it is only the 

 last, or the two last placentae which remain in the cornua of the uterus. 



With ruminant animals, however, retention is far from rare ; though 

 even in them there is a difference in this respect, according to species — 

 this accident being much more frequent in the Cow than in the Sheep or 

 Goat. This frequency in ruminant animals is doubtless due to the pecu- 

 liar conformation of their placentae — the cotyledonal arrangement being 

 evidently opposed to segregation. 



But if the Cow is the animal of all others in which this accident occurs, 

 it is also the one which appears to be the least inconvenienced by it ; 

 for, as Saint-Cyr correctly observes, it is not uncommon to see Cows 

 which four, six, eight, and even ten or twelve days after parturition, have 

 not got rid of the placenta, and yet are lively, the appetite is Unimpaired, 

 and they continue to ruminate and give milk as if there was nothing 

 amiss. 



