DISEASES OF THE GEISTERATIVE ORGANS. 195 



the brim, the whole limb can be promptly and easily extended. In 

 cases presenting special difficulty in raising the foot over the brim, 

 help may be had by traction on a rope passed around in front of the 

 hock, and later still b}^ a rope with a noose fastened to the pastern. 

 In the worst cases, with the buttocks and hocks wedged deeply into 

 the passages, it may prove difficult or impossible to push the buttocks 

 back into the abdomen, and in such case the extension of the hind 

 limb is practically impossible without mutilation. In some roomy 

 cows a calf may be dragged through the passages by ropes attached 

 to the bent hocks, but even when this is possible there is great risk of 

 laceration of the floor of the vagina by the feet. The next resort is 

 to cut the hamstring just above the point of the hock and the tendon 

 on the front of the limb (flexor metatarsi) just above the hock, and 

 even the sinews behind the shank bone just below the hock. This 

 allows the stifle and hock to move independently of each other, the 

 one undergoing extension without entailing the extension of the 

 other; it also allows both joints to flex completely, so that the im- 

 pacted mass can pass through a narrower channel. If now, by drag- 

 ging on the hocks and operating with the repeller on the buttocks, 

 the latter can be tilted forward sufficiently to allow of the extension 

 of the stifle, the jam will be at once overcome, and the calf may be 

 extracted with the hock bent, but the stifle extended. If even this 

 can not be accomplished, it may now be possible to extract the whole 

 mass with both hocks and stifles fully bent. To attempt this, trac- 

 tion may be made on the rope around the hocks and on a sharp hook 

 (PL XX, fig. 2) passed forward between the thighs and hooked on to 

 the brim of the pelvis. Everything else failing, the offending limb 

 or limbs may be cut off at the hip joint and extracted, after which 

 extraction may proceed by dragging on the remaining limb, or by 

 hooks on the hip bones. Very little is to be gained by cutting off the 

 limb at the hock, and the stifle is less accessible than the hip, and 

 amputation of the stifle gives much poorer results. 



Hind limhs hent forward from the hip — Breech 'presentation. — 

 This is an exaggeration of the condition last described, only the 

 hocks and stifles are fully extended and the whole limb carried for- 

 ward beneath the belly. (PI. XVII, fig. 2.) The water bags appear 

 and burst, but nothing presents unless it may be the tail. Examina- 

 tion in this case detects the outline of the buttocks, with the tail and 

 anus at its upper part. 



The remedy, as in the case last described, consists in pushing the 

 buttock upward and forward with a repeller, the cow being kept 

 standing and headed downhill until the thigh bone can be reached 

 and used as a lever. Its upper end is pushed forward and its lower 

 end raised until, the joints becoming fully flexed, the point of the 

 hock can be raised above the brim of the pelvis. If necessary a noose 



