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48 A De SCRIPT ION OF ALL THE Secl. IX. 
ly certain, that nothing can be fo pernicious as opening the fac, and that the 
bowels ought to be returned without expofmg them to the ain 
To make this more evident, I lhall fuppofe that the bowels cannot be redu- 
ced by taxis^ or that the operation is neceffary in two hundred patients ; and 
that in one fourth part of the riuihbef the bowels are fo much ftrangulated 
and inflamed that the termination in a mortification could not by any means 
be prevented, but that in the other three fourths there is a probable chance 
that the inflammation may be difperfed. 
If the operation be done in all thefe cafes by opening the fac, it is probable 
that of the firfl: fifty we may fiave one or two in all ; and of the other hundred 
and fifty, thirty or forty at the utmoft. Whereas, if we fuppofe that in all 
thefe patients the Ikin and tendon only are divided, and the bowels reduced 
without opening the fac, we fliould indeed lofe all thofe in whom the morti- 
fication was complete : but I am well convinced we Ihould not lofe above ten 
or twenty at mofl: of the other hundred and fifty j and that, upon the whole* 
many more lives would be faved. 
After having reafoned in this manner upon the fubjed for feveral years, I 
determined to put this method of operating to the trial, and have accordingly 
diredled it to be pradifed in four cafes ; in all of which the patient feemed to 
be in great danger, and yet every one of them recovered without a Angle bad 
fymptom in confequence of the operation. 
In 1770 I was called, along with Mr Alexander Wood, to a cafe of crural 
hernia in a woman thirty-five years of age, with fymptoms of flrangulation 
which had continued three days. Finding it impoflible to reduce it, I- prevail- 
ed with Mr Wood to cut the tendon without opening the fac, and then to 
attempt the redudion which we executed with the utmoft eafe. 
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