44 OBSTETFJCAL AX ATOMY. 



The cornua are thin and tapering at their anterior extremity, and the 

 body is short and narrow ; while the interior of the uterus is not so 

 ample as in the Mare. Here it oii'ers a peculiarity which is not observed 

 in the latter animal, the Carnivora, or the Pig, in the presence of 

 rounded smooth prominences named caruncles or cotyledonal processes 

 {placenta uterince), which increase in number with the size of the 

 species. The maternal cotyledons are most numerous in the cornua, 

 and few and small in the body of the uterus : they are about the size of 

 a pea or haricot-bean, in calves : at a later period they have acquired 

 the dimensions of a button, and they increase largely and assume 

 variable shapes during gestation. In the Cow they are flat or slightly 

 convex on the top, but concave in the Sheep and Goat, and their 

 colour is usually pale ; after conception, however, they become red 

 from the afflux of blood to them. They are intended for the reception 

 of similar processes on one of the foetal membranes, the chorion, 

 and will be noticed more fully hereafter. It may be sufficient now to 

 mention that their number in the Calf sometimes amounts to thirty or 





Fig. 25. 

 HoRizosT.\L Section of the Upper Surface of the Micous Membrane, 



NEAR TO A COTTLEDON, OF THE UTERUS OF A NON-GRAVID COW : ^IaGNIFIED 



ISO Diameters. 



a, Section of a Utricular Gland, and a' its Proper Structure ; h, h. Mucous 

 Glands ; c, c, Adenoid Tissue. 



forty ; and after parturition there have been counted as many as from 

 eighty to one hundred and twenty. They are disposed in linear or 

 longitudinal series which are all the more numerous as the cornu is 

 wide ; there being four series near the body of the uterus (which has 

 none), two at the anterior extremity, and three in the middle. Each is 

 attached to the mucous membrane by a narrow pedicle, and in removing 

 the foetal placenta after parturition, care has to be taken not to tear 

 them off. 



The cervix uteri of the Cow is from 2| to 3^ inches in length ; it is 

 narrow, almost as firm as cartilage in texture, and irregular in shape ; 

 the mucous membrane is more finely plicated over it, around the os 

 tinea, than in the Mare. The fibres composing the cervix are divergent 

 and circular. At an early age this part is nearly circular in shape, and 

 the body of the uterus is so small that the cervix and cornua are close 

 together, or joined to each other at their origin from it. Towards 

 puberty, however, in all the larger domesticated animals it becomes 

 fusiform, and shows two lips, about two inches in length — an anterior 

 and posterior, the last the longest — which are pulpy to the touch ; these 



