DISEASES OF THE GENERATIVE OKGANS. 155 



a sense of greater fullness when handled ; the wrinkles in the skin 

 become shallower and are effaced, and the teats are materially enlarged. 

 Beginning a few weeks after conception, this tends to a steady develop- 

 ment, though slight alternations in the sense of successive growth and 

 shrinkage are not uncommon. In milking cows this does not hold, as 

 the milk usually tends to a steady diminution and the udder shrinks 

 slowly until near the completion of the period, when it undergoes its 

 sudden remarkable development, and yields at first a serous liquid 

 and then the yellow colostrum, which coagulates when heated. As 

 pregnancy advances the mucous membrane lining the vulva becomes 

 swollen and of a darker bluish red hue, and the mucous secretion 

 increases, becoming very abundant just before calving. When the 

 feeding has not been altered or restricted, a steady diminution of the 

 salts of lime excreted in the urine is an attendant on pregnancy, the 

 lime being demanded for the growing body of the fetus. 



After the fifth month the movements of the calf may often be 

 observed in the right flank, nearly in front of the stifle, when the cow 

 is drinking cold water. The sensation of cold on the side of the first 

 stomach, which lies to the left and directly below the womb (PL I), 

 stimulates the calf to active movements, which are detected on the 

 sudden jerking outward of the abdominal wall as if from blows deliv- 

 ered from within. In a loose pendent abdomen in the latter months 

 of gestation the skin may often be seen pushed out at a sharp angle, 

 irrespective of the period of drinking. 



Another mode of examination through the flank is by touch. The 

 palm of the hand is pressed strongly inward, about 8 inches in front of 

 the stifle and a little below, several times in succession, and is then 

 brought to rest with the pressure maintained. Presently there are felt 

 distinct and characteristic movements of the fetus, which has been 

 disturbed and roused to action. Another mode is to press the closed 

 fist strongly inward in the same situation and hold it so, forming a 

 deep indentation in the abdominal wall. Presently the knuckles are 

 felt to be struck by a solid body, which is no other than the fetus that 

 had been displaced to the left by the push of the hand, and now floats 

 back in its liquid covering (amniotic fluid; see PI. XII) downward 

 and to the right. 



Of all the modes of examination by touch, that done through the 

 rectum gives the earliest satisfactory indications. The hand and arm 

 well oiled are introduced, and the excrement having been removed if 

 necessary, the palm of the hand is turned downward and the floor of 

 the pelvis carefully examined. There will be felt in the median line 

 the pear-shaped outline of the bladder, more or less full, rounded or 

 tense, according to the quantity of urine it contains. Between this 

 and the hand will be felt a soft, somewhat rounded tubular body, 

 which divides in front into two smaller tubes or branches, extending to 

 the right and left into the abdomen. This is the womb, which in its 



