10 FISCHER ON THE PELVIS OF THE MAMMALIA. 



mated thighs, as they exist in the lower mammals, support the remote portion 

 of the lower belly, and no less prevent too forcible a protrusion of the intes- 

 tines against the abdominal walls, than do immoveable bones themselves ; so 

 also in man, it is safest when vomiting is about to occur, to bend the thighs 

 towards the abdomen, lest the effort of vomiting should give rise to a hernia, 

 through the abdominal rings or under Poupart's ligament. Hence also it 

 seems ill advised to extend with bandages the thighs of recently born children, 

 in whom the peritoneal processes leading into the scrotum have not yet be- 

 come contracted or closed. Nature has already taught them at that age to 

 draw the thighs towards the abdomen, and this may be the main prevention 

 against the passage of the intestines, through the abdominal rings, along with 

 the testes in children, whilst enclosed in the uterus. The lower an animal 

 walks with bended thighs, the narrower will be, in that animal, the os ilium, 

 and the more does it seem pressed hard as it were against the sacrum through- 

 out its whole length ; so that a series, perhaps uninterrupted, might be formed 

 or admitted, from man, in whom the broadest os ilium comparatively is united 

 with the os sacrum almost at a right angle, to the mole, in which animal an 

 extremely narrow os ilium evidently unites throughout its whole length with 

 the lateral margin of the os sacrum, the great ischiatic notch having entirely 

 disappeared. 



I shall here stop, reserving all further observations for the distinct heads of 

 your dissertation, to which they may refer. It remains for me to express hopes 

 for your enjoyment of health ; that many may owe their health to you ; and 

 that you remain a steady cultivator of the sciences especially requiring support 

 in these times of trouble, commotion, and dreadful wars. Farewell. 



FISCHER ON THE PELYIS OF THE MAMMALIA. 



1st Man. Section 1. Nature has given to the human race the broadest and 

 most depressed pelvis of any animal, seemingly required by his erect position, 

 and by the size of the head of the foetus ; by the spreading out of the ossa 

 ilium the intestines are supported, and by the capacity of the female pelvis, a 

 ready exit is provided for the fully grown foetus. 



Section 2. The pelvis of other mammals is longer and narrower than the 

 human ; and the bones of the ilium scarcely diverge, but ascend almost 

 straight, or parallel. 



Section 3. In mankind, the superior aperture of the smaller, or true, pel- 

 vis, presents a plane, nearer the horizontal ; whilst in other animals, the line 

 drawn from the promontory of the os sacrum to the superior angle of the 

 symphysis of the pubis, called the conjugate diameter, descends more perpen- 

 dicularly ; hence, in mankind, the transverse is larger than the conjugate 

 diameter ; in other mammals it is less, with a few exceptions, as in the pelvis 

 of the horse, the buffalo, and the dromedary. 



Section 4. The quadrumana most nearly resemble the human structure, 

 and this holds also of the pelvis, and amongst these, chiefly the simia satyrus. 

 The Bellua follow these, chiefly the Elephant, &c.; then the solidungela, 



