A HUMAN EMBRYO TWENTY-SIX DAYS OLD. 



F. MALL. 



Several years ago Dr. C. O. Miller of the Johns Hopkins 

 University gave me a very young human embryo which was so 

 well preserved and so perfect in all respects that it justified a 

 very careful study. He very kindly has procured for me the 

 following history. 



"The woman, twenty-nine years old, had been married nine 

 years, and had always menstruated regularly every twenty-eight 

 days, the period each time lasting three days. She had given 

 birth to four healthy children, the last having been born January 

 r, 1888. Her last menstrual period began on October 6, 1888, 

 and ended on the 9th. Her next menstrual period should have 

 begun on November 3, but on account of its falling out, she 

 concluded that she was pregnant, and, on November 20, began 

 taking large doses of ergot, which she had repeatedly taken to 

 produce abortion in earlier pregnancies, but with no result. 

 Several days later she applied to a professional abortionist who 

 used instruments, after which she had a continuous metrorrhagia, 

 and called for me to attend her. On November 27, just fifty- 

 two days after the beginning of the last menstrual period, the 

 unbroken ovum came away. It was kept in a cool place for 

 three hours, and then without opening placed in eighty per 

 cent alcohol." 



When the specimen came into my hands it was found covered 

 with villi two or three millimetres in length, without which it 

 measured 22 mm. in diameter. Upon opening it I found that 

 the embryo had been hardened without any irregular shrinkage. 

 A year later it was shown by staining a portion of the mem- 

 branes that the cells were preserved excellently ; and the em- 

 bryo was then stained with alum carmine, imbedded in paraffin, 

 and cut into sections at right angles to the branchial arches 15 /j, 

 thick. 



459 



