Tin: EMPLOYMKXT (>F FORCE IX DVSTOKIA. 529 



yet for convenience in application, portability, and steady graduated 

 traction, nothing can approach the light obstetric pulley, the manner 

 of using which is shown in the annexed drawing (Fig. 19G). 



When very powerful traction is required, whether manual or machine, 

 there is the risk — particularly if the animal is standing — of dragging 

 it backwards until it falls, or doing it some injury utdess the precaution 

 is adopted of lixing it in some way. It is obvious that there is great 

 danger — indeed cruelty — in attaching it merely by the head or neck, 

 and allowing this to bear all the strain. It is necessary to render the 

 creature immovable by passing cords, bands, or a sack behind the thighs 

 and above the hocks, bringing the ends towards the animal's shoulders, 

 and maintaining them there either by assistants, or by attaching them to 

 the manger or any other part sufliciently strong. A wooden bar placed 

 behind the thighs and secured to the stall-posts, is also serviceable ; as 

 is likewise an ordinai'y harness breeching, the front parts being secured 

 to rings in the wall or manger. In some cases, vigorous assistants, by 

 placing their back against the haunches of the animal, will offer 

 sullicient resistance to its displacement. Many practitioners prefer 

 throwing the animal down, if it is standing, in order to avoid the 

 dangers of being dragged ; Schaack even asserts that the body when 

 lying on the ground increases the expulsive efforts, and keeps the ftt'tus 

 in the plane of the pelvis. Donnarieix is not afraid of seeing the animal 

 dragged a little, and recommends that the traction should not cease in 

 consequence. Nevertheless, during decubitus the operator is more 

 quickly fatigued, besides being restrained in his movements ; the neces- 

 sary manu'uvres are more difficult to perform, and the weight of the 

 foetus is often an additional obstacle. And even when the creature is 

 lying, if the traction is very strong, it is often necessary to prevent the 

 body being drawn backwards. 



All these inconveniences being recognised by Baron, in 1858 he in- 

 troduced an obstetrical machine in the form of an apparatus for pro- 

 ducing sustained traction {apparcil a traction soutenuc) in the extraction 

 of the fcctus. This apparatus presses against the hind-quarters of the 

 parturient animal, and owing to its construction it can not only develop 

 a very energetic extractive force in the gentlest and most inoffensive 

 way possible, but itself produces the counter-extension in an exactly 

 proportionate degree. 



The principal parts of the machine are : a kind of horse-collar 

 (Fig. 197, A) with three stalks (B, C, D) intermediate between this 

 collar and a broad, fixed, female screw (E), which receives a movable 

 screw rod (II) that bears a revolving hook and chain (K) at one end ; 

 the other end of the chain has also a hook to which the cord or cords 

 fixed on the fa-tus are attached. The collar is made of several pieces 

 of light wood superposed, and bound together by an iron band applied 

 to its posterior surface. This band is perforated by three screwed 

 holes placed in a triangular position, and which receive the iron stalks. 

 The anterior face of the collar is so fashioned as to fit closely on the 

 liind parts of the animal, the space for the passage of the fatus being 

 about twenty inches in diameter. The intermediate stalks (B, C, D) 

 serve to transmit to the collar the pressure exercised by the female 

 screw ; they are about forty inches long, and each is composed of 

 two pieces, one of these being hollow (4, o, 6), the other solid (1, 2, 3) : 

 consequently, one fits into the other, and the end opposite the collar 

 enters one of the openings in the flange of the female screw (10) ; a 



34 



