74 
Sir Everarp Home on the existence 
cleared as an extraordinary fact* and not to be accounted for, 
is readily explained, since absorption depends fully as much 
upon nervous influence as the action of the arteries : a child 
ip uterQ having an ague, is in itself almost a proof of the pla^ 
cepta having nerves.-f 
A child being born without a brain is not to be marvelled 
at, the nerves of the child being connected with the brain of 
the mother, 
The immediate division of the navel-string at the moment 
of the birth, in some particular instances having hazarded the 
life of the child, hinted at by Dr. Denman, shows the accu- 
racy of his observations. 
♦ There are several cases in the Philosophical Transactions of children having the 
small-pox in utero, and one that was read before the Society, but not published. 
Two of these were in England ; in both of them the child took the infection on 
or about the 14th day. 
One was in Jamaica; and the infection was taken by the child on the 8th day. 
This difference appears to deserve being recorded. 
f Dr. Patrick Russel, states a case of ague occurring in a child in utero, in 
Aleppo. 
In June, 1767, a healthy young woman, in the seventh month of her third preg- 
nancy, was attacked by a tertian fever, and the foetus in utero appeared to suffer a 
paroxysm distinct from the mother. 
The fits in the mother returned regularly about noon, and terminated by, a pro- 
fuse sweat in less than ten hours. 
About 8 in the morning of the odd days, the woman felt the child tremble with 
great violence ; she also felt a weight and coldness in the womb ; the coldness went 
off in less, than 15 minutes, and was succeeded for more than an hour by agiowing 
heat; the child was at intervals restless, as she had felt in her other children 
during pregnancy, but the trembling she never before experienced. 
After the sixth paroxysm the bark effected a cure. 
Dr. Russel, while at Aleppo, met with a few similar instances, but had attri- 
l^uted them to the effect of imagination, which in this woman he could not do, as 
she was remarkable for her cheerful disposition, and good sense. Tram, of « 
Society for the Improrement of Medical and Chirurgical Knowledge, vol. iii. p, 96. 
