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PvEFACi: TU THE FIRST EDITION. 



Wmkn we consider the vast and yearly increasing amount of animal 

 wealth we possess, the great skill, attention, and expense bestowed on 

 the perfecting of the most important of the domesticated creatures, 

 which are daily becoming more essential factors in our progressive 

 civilization, it is somewhat remarkable, and rather discreditable, 

 though not altogether inexplicable, that nothing in the way of a work 

 devoted to the parturition of animals, and to the diseases and accidents 

 incidental to that period, has yet appeared in the English language. 

 For very many years the Anglo-Saxon race has devoted itself most 

 assiduously and praiseworthily, and with the greatest measure of 

 success, to the multiplication and full development of those (jualities 

 which more particularly enhance tlie value and utility of these animals. 

 This has entailed unwearied etYorts, the closest and shrewdest observa- 

 tion, and all the judgment and practical and scientific knowledge which 

 generations of men could afford. 



It might therefore be considered that everything relating to the 

 reproduction and reai'ing of these creatures must, from a materialistic 

 point of view alone, be of great moment not only to breeders and stock- 

 raisers, but to the entire community. Great loss may be, and far too 

 often is, quickly sustained among animals during the pregnant or 

 parturient period, and this loss may not only prove very serious to 

 individuals, but make itself gravely felt by the general public. A 

 treatise which might aid, to however small an extent, in pointing out 

 how these losses may be averted or remedied, nmst surely, then, prove 

 a welcome boon to those who are engaged in breeding and raising 

 animals, as well as to all who are interested — and few are not — in their 

 nmltiplication and welfare. At the conunencement of this century a 

 book was i)ublished, entitled, " A Practical Treatise on the Parturition 

 of the Cow, or the Extraction of the Calf ; and also on the Diseases of 

 Neat Cattle in General." The author was Edward Skellet, " Professor 

 of that part of the Veterinary Art "; but that and otiier parts of this art 

 were certainly in a very crude, meagre, and elementary condition in the 

 days when Skellet ventured to touch upon them ; and yet his book may 

 be said to be the only attempt which has been made in this direction in 

 England. Papers on Obstetricy—soine of them of much value — have 

 appeared from time to time in professional journals ; but while in other 

 countries many treatises have been produced, no one in tliis country 

 has undertaken the task of supplying what has, for very many years, 

 been an urgent want — a text-book of Obstetricy worthy of modern 

 Veterinary Science. The necessity for such a guide has been felt more 

 particularly by the Veterinary practitioner at the commencement of his 

 career ; for only too frequently he has had to rely entirely upon his own 

 resources, and to painfully acqmre, at the expense of his employers, that 



