640 PATHOLOGY OF PARTURITION. 



tongue is moved about ; the head is raised ; attempts are made to get 

 up ; it elevates the fore-part of the body, and after some struggles 

 finally gets on its hind-legs and stands. The first favourable indications 

 are elevation of temperature and resumption of the intestinal peristalsis. 

 The latter is assured vs^hen the rectum is found to be filled with ftBces, 

 after it has been emptied. 



The animal's physiognomy changes, and becomes natural — though 

 it may still look half stupefied; it drinks and seeks food, and is not 

 long in commencing to ruminate ; its calf is caressed ; urine and fseces 

 are passed ; and recovery sets in so promptly, and goes on so quickly, 

 that in many cases it is scarcely possible to believe that the animal, 

 v^hich twenty-four hours previously appeared to be dying, is now not 

 only recovering, but apparently completely recovered without being 

 convalescent. 



When death is about to take place, the more serious symptoms are 

 still more marked. The collapsus — the coma — becomes more and 

 more complete. The nose rests on the ground as if the animal could 

 no longer support the head, and at times sways from side to side. 

 The decubitus, instead of being sternal, becomes lateral, and the 

 body is stretched out at full length. The eye is glassy, and there 

 is no movement of the eyelids when the cornea is touched ; the body 

 and mouth are colder ; the tympanitis increases ; the pulse becomes 

 small, irregular, intermittent, and very quick, until at last it is 

 imperceptible ; the breathing is puffing, slower, and more stertorous, 

 and the animal dies without a struggle, or in the midst of slight com- 

 vulsions. 



In some cases there are epileptiform movements, or there may be 

 symptoms of delirium : the animal throws its head about violently 

 from side to side, or bends it rigidly backwards, struggles, bellows, 

 groans, extends the limbs convulsively as if undergoing an electric 

 shock, and appears to be unconscious ; the breathing is deep and 

 spasmodic, and apoplexy — parturient apoplexy — seems to be the cause 

 of death. 



Dtiration, Terminations, and Complications. 



The duration of the disease is very brief. There are instances on 

 record in which it has been less than twenty-four hours ; but two or 

 three days is the ordinary term ; it has rarely extended to five or six 

 days. 



If there are no complications, the terminations are death or recovery. 

 The chief complications are broncho -pneumonia, milk -metastasis, 

 amaurosis, temporary or permanent paralysis (sometimes in the form 

 of monoplegias), gangrene of certain parts, and swellings in the region 

 of the thigh and hocks. 



Pneumonia is due to the passage of foreign matters — either food or 

 medicine — into the air-passages during the period when the animal 

 cannot swallow, or when it is comatose, and meteorismus and eructa- 

 tions are present. This is often a cause of death when the Cow has 

 recovered from the pai^turient malady. Indeed, the animal may perish 

 from suffocation alone when the quantity of matter that passes through 

 the larynx is considerable. And not infrequently, when the creature 

 has lingered for a few days and is then killed, the existence of pneu- 

 monia from this cause will be discovered on making an examination 



