METRITIS, METRO-PERITONITIS, ETC. 647 



colored or greyish fluid, composed of effused blood, remains of foetal 

 envelopes, the secretions of the mucous membranes — all in a more or less 

 advanced state of decomposition, and emitting the most repulsive odor. 

 This fluid contains quantities of epithelial and round cells, fat globules, 

 and decomposition bacteria. The quantity of fluid varies considerably, 

 according to circumstances — amounting sometimes to many gallons. 



The uterus itself is never contracted as in the normal condition, and it 

 is often two or three times larger than it ought to be. 



The walls of the organ are thickened, friable, softened, intensely red, 

 and infiltrated with sanguinolent serosity, inflammatory products, and pus 

 globules. The mucous membrane is thickened, of a dirty-brown or dark- 

 green tint, livid, softened, ecchymosed in places, and covered here and 

 there with diphtheritic or fibrinous exudates and blood-clots, the latter 

 being chiefly found — in the Cow — at the base of the cotyledons, which 

 are, with the exudates and clots, in process of putrefaction, and are grey, 

 pulpy, and almost detached. Sometimes portions of decomposed foetal 

 membranes yet remain attached to the cotyledons ; and there are here 

 and there gangrenous eschars, in the form of green or greyish spongy 

 masses of a diphtheritic nature, and which are in process of softening 

 and dissolution. In all these alterations — which are usually very notable 

 in the cornu that contained the foetus — we have the characteristic fea- 

 tures of Endometritis scptica. 



It is seldom, indeed, that the puerperal or septic inflammation is limited 

 to the mucous membrane. Nearly always it extends to the submucous 

 connective tissue {Metritis phleg77ionosd) which is infiltrated with an oede- 

 matous transudation ; or it becomes the seat of acute inflammatory 

 oedema, in which the tissue swells, becomes tumid, and its interstices 

 filled with fluid, small cells, and a gelatinous, semi-solid material. The 

 muscular tissue is swollen and softened, and a dark fluid flows from it. 



The sub-peritoneal connective tissue of the uterus may suffer in a like 

 manner, and undergo necrotic softening and putrefaction j while the 

 serous membrane itself becomes inflamed {Metro-perito?iitis) . 



When this takes place, the abdominal cavity contains a quantity of 

 reddish, turbid, sanious serosity, in which are flakes of lymph. The 

 lining membrane of this cavity, and especially that covering the uterus, 

 is highly inflamed, and its surface is covered with pseudo-membranous 

 layers of fibrin ; while adhesion may have taken place between the dif- 

 ferent organs it covers. In some cases the inflammation of the peri- 

 toneum is not so diffuse, and is more or less limited to the uterus and 

 organs immediately adjacent. 



In other cases, again, the phlegmonous inflammation extends to the 

 pelvic connective tissue {Parametritis), and we have diffuse acute oedema, 

 infiltration with pus, or even abscesses. 



Indeed, in the uterine connective tissue we may have, in different 

 parts, active cell-proliferation and abscesses, and if the animal chances 

 to live beyond a certain period, these terminate in caseous inspissation, 

 or even perforation into the abdominal cavity. 



A very important pathological lesion, and one which is not unfre- 

 quently noted in parametritis, is thrombosis of the veins and lymphatics. 

 Thrombosis of the uterine veins has been observed in animals : solid, 

 white or yellowish thrombi adhering to the internal surface of the vessels, 

 and extending towards the larger venous trunks — even as far as the pos- 

 terior vena cava. Sometimes the breaking-up of these thrombi causes 



