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posed to infection ; but, at the same time, when they are seized with af- 

 fections, which in other persons, or at another season, would be without 

 danger, they sink under them, because these diseases, though at first very 

 slight, easily put on a malignant character. The progress of mortal dis- 

 eases is retarded ; a phthisical woman, and who has only a few months 

 to live, shall prolong her life through the whole term of gestation. The 

 consolidation of fractures is nothing slower, though Fabricius Hildanus 

 pretends that the state of pregnancy pats a complete stop to it. 



I have never been able to find any difference in the time of formation of 

 callus, between pregnant women and others. M. Boyer avows the same 

 opinion*. Among the authors who have asserted that fractures could not 

 consolidate during pregnancy, some have conjectured that this depends 

 on Nature; who is busy in directing the humours to the uterus, forget- 

 ting, in some sort, every other function, and omitting to institute the pro- 

 cess necessary to the cure. But as we shall see, whatever may be the 

 importance of the uterus, charged, during pregnancy, with the fruit of 

 conception, the foetus is merely an organ added to the organs of the mo- 

 ther, and assimilating to itself the juices it receives from the uterine ves- 

 sels. It does not hinder the other parts from getting their nourishment: 

 they all go on living, and separating to themselves the juices their exist- 

 ence or their functions require. Haller ascribes the difficulty with which 

 the broken ends unite, in pregnant women, to the great quantity of earthy 

 matter which the foetus draws off from the mother. This opinion will 

 not stand; for, as I have shown in my preliminary discourse, the phos- 

 phate of lime has but little to do in the work of re-union, which chiefly 

 goes on by changes in that part of the bone which is really organic. Be- 

 sides, this hypothesis would imply that consolidation were as difficult in 

 nurses, whose milk carries off a large quantity of phosphate of lime. Yet 

 it has not been observed that the formation of callus is more difficult du- 

 ring suckling. Lastly, on this, as on all occasions, experience is more 

 effectual than reasoning ; now, experience shows, that the time required 

 for the formation of callus, in pregnant women, is not sensibly longer than 

 in their ordinary state. 



Meanwhile, the uterus, imbued with prolific fluid, swells, to avail my- 

 self of the expression of a modern, like a lip stung by a bee : it becomes 

 a centre of fluxion towards which the humours tend from all quarters. 

 The diameter of its vessels increases with the thickness of its parietes : 

 these soften, and their muscular nature becomes more markedf. Till 

 the end of the third month, the only appearance of pregnancy is in the 

 suspension of menstruation : the uterus, f which the cervix has yet un- 

 dergone no change, has concentrated itself behind the pubis, but very 

 soon it rises above the upper outlet of the pelvis, pushing upwards the 

 intestines and the rest of the abdominal viscera. Towards the end of 

 pregnancy, it rises above the umbilicus, its fundus comes in contact with 

 the arch of the colon, and reaches sometimes to the epigastric region. 

 The compression it exerts on the organs of digestion, explains the loath- 

 ings, and the nausea which belong to the state of pregnancy. The de- 

 rangement of sensibility, by the affection of the great sympathetic^, ac- 

 counts equally for those depraved tastes, those fantastic appetites, which 



* Lecons de M. Boycr, svir les Maladies des Os, refugees en un Traite coir.plet cle ces 

 Maladies, par A. Richerand, 2 vols. 8vo. 



j- According to M. Lobstein, the uterus, during 1 pregnancy, is ixnalagotis to an organ 

 in a state of chronic inflammation. 



