558 Veterinary Obstetrics 



position or to pick the fetus up by the hind feet for a few 

 moments. 



Artificial respiration may also be induced by the usual com- 

 pression and relaxation of the chest walls, or by inffating 

 the lungs by forcing air through the nostrils with a small bel- 

 lows, should such an apparatus be at hand. So long as the 

 heart continues to beat, there is a possibility of inducing respira- 

 tion, and efforts should consequently be continued, so long as the 

 cardiac action persists. As a general rule, respiration cannot be 

 established at all unless it succeeds very promptly, so that in 

 those cases where the animal does not breathe within two or 

 three minutes it will probably die in spite of the fact that the 

 heart may continue to act for lo or 15 minutes. 



2. The umbilic cord must be divided and the la.st direct rela- 

 tion between the mother and young severed. This division re- 

 sults in a wound which involves the arteries, veins and urachus, 

 each of which communicates with internal parts of the system of 

 the young animal. Different writers assume different attitudes 

 toward the care of the navel of the new-born. Naturally, the 

 umbilic cord becomes ruptured in a variety of ways. In the 

 foal the cord is so long (3 feet) that it is usually not ruptured 

 when the fetus is expelled, if the mare is recumbent, but gives 

 way only when she rises to her feet, and even then in some cases 

 not until she turns her head toward the fetus in order to care for 

 it, and in so doing pulls the cord in two near the umbilicus. In 

 other cases, in the mare, the chorion becomes detached from the 

 uterus almost immediately after the expulsion of the fetus and 

 comes away with the cord still intact. It is then ruptured later 

 by the struggles of the fetus itself. The mare may step upon 

 some portion of the membranes when the foal is attempting to 

 get up, and the foal, in falling, throws its weight upon the cord 

 in such a way as to rupture it. 



In the cow the umbilic cord is very short (about 12 to 15 

 inches) and is almost always ruptured just as the fetus emerges 

 from the birth canal, or even slightly before. In carnivora and 

 the .sow the umbilic cord is frequently not ruptured in a spon- 

 taneous way, but is torn in two by the teeth of the mother. 



The point at which the navel cord naturally ruptures or is 

 divided by the mother corresponds quite closely in all our do- 

 mestic animals. In examining the navel cord of the foal, we 



