153 



Food that tends to eostiveness should be avoided. "Water g-iven often, 

 and at a temperature considerably above freezing, Avill avoid the dan- 

 gers of indigestion and abortion which result from taking too much 

 ice-cold water at one time. Very cold or frozen food is objectionable 

 in the same sense. Severe surgical operations and medicines that act 

 violentlj^ on the womb, bowels, or kidneys are to be avoided as being 

 liable to cause abortion. Constipation should be corrected, if possi- 

 ble, by bran mashes, carrots, or beets, seconded by exercise, and if a 

 medicinal laxative is required it should be olive oil or other equally 

 bland agent. 



The stall of the pregnant mare should not be too narrow so as to 

 cramp her Avhen lying doAvn, or to entail violent efforts in getting up, 

 and it should not slope too much from the front backward, as this 

 throws the weight of the uterus back on the pelvis and endangers pro- 

 trusions and even abortion. Violent mental impressions are to be 

 avoided, for though the majority of mares are not affected thereby, 

 yet a certain number are so profoundly impressed, that peculiarities 

 and distortions are entailed on the offspring. Hence, there is wisdom 

 shown in banishing i)arti-colored or objectionably tinted animals, and 

 those that show deformities or faulty conformation. Hence, too, the 

 importance of preventing prolonged acute suffering by the pregnant 

 mare, as certain troubles of the eyes, feet, and joints in the foals have 

 been clearly traced to the concentration of the mother's mind on cor- 

 responding injured organs in herself. Sire and dam alike tend to 

 reproduce their personal defects which predispose to disease, but the 

 dam is far more likely to jjerpetuate the evil in her progeny wdiich 

 w'as carried while she was personally enduring severe suffering caused 

 by such defects. Hence, an active bone spavin or ring-bone, causing 

 lameness, is more objectionable than that in which the inflammation 

 and lameness have both passed, and an active oj)hthalmia is more 

 to be feared than even an old cataract. For this reason all active dis- 

 eases in the breeding mare should be soothed and abated at as early 

 a moment as possible. 



EXTRA-UTERINE GESTATION. 



It is rare in the domestic animals to find the fcetus developed else- 

 wiiere than in the womb. The exceptional forms are those in which 

 the sperm of the male, making its Avay through the womb and Fallo- 

 pian tubes, impregnates the ovum prior to its escape, and in which the 

 now vitalized and growing ovum, by reason of its gradually increas- 

 ing size, becomes imprisoned and fails to escape into the womb. The 

 arrest of the ovum maybe in the substance of the ovary itself (ovarian 

 pregnancy), in the Fallopian tube (tubal pregnancy), or when by its 

 continuous enlargement it has ruptured its envelopes so that it escapes 

 into the cavity of the abdomen, it may become attached to any part 

 of the serious membrane and draw its nourishment directlv from that 



