PROGRESS OF VETERINARY SCIENCE ANI) ART. 699 
" Mr. Cooper repeated the experiments of Duverger, who had succeeded 
in uniting by suture the divided intestine of a dog, including in it a portion 
of the trachea of a calf. In place of the uninterrupted suture three distinct 
stitches were inserted. On the sixteenth day the animal was killed, and the 
union was complete. 
“ He then made the experiment without including the foreign substance. 
On the second day the dog took food, and on the fifth the ligatures were 
drawn away, after which he suffered nothing from the experiments. In 
both these cases, it should be observed, the intestine rested against the 
wound, and was confined there, the ligatures depending externally.* 
“ To Dr. Thomson, Regius Professor of Military Surgery at Edinburgh, 
we are indebted for the following curious and important additions to our 
knowledge of this subject. After the transverse section of the small intes- 
tine of a dog, five uninterrupted stitches were applied at equal intervals, the 
ligatures cut close, and the external wound sewn. On the tenth day the 
animal was killed. A portion of the intestine, more thick and vascular than 
usual, adhered to the wound of the parietes, but the line of division was 
imperceptible on the outside of the intestine. On slitting it open, it was 
discovered that three of the stitches had disappeared, but the place of their 
former attachment could be distinctly perceived on the inner surface of the 
bowel. Two threads were still adhering to the wound. Einding that the 
thread had passed from the outer to the inner side of the intestine, Dr. 
Thomson repeated the experiment, allowing the animal which was the 
subject of it to survive six weeks. Upon inspection no distinct mark of 
division appeared externally, but on inverting a portion of the gut, two 
stitches were found adhering to its inner surface. The remainder had been 
discharged, but the traces of them were yet visible. The portions of the gut 
included in the remaining ligatures were obviously vascular, so that it is 
difficult to say when the ligatures might have separated.”-}- 
As Mr. Travers says, at page 131, it has been found 
sufficient for the purpose of union to include only the 
peritoneal covering of the intestine in the suture, a proof 
that provided the several extremities are fairly brought into 
contact, the event, under any circumstances, will be uniform. 
The uninterrupted suture has been substituted for stitches, 
and the principles to guide us in the operation are clearly 
set forth in a most interesting case, occurring in a woman, 
published in the ‘ Lancet 5 for 1851, in which my friend 
Mr. Lister operated. The wound in the abdominal walls 
had to be dilated to get at the injured gut, and two wounds 
which had been inflicted were neatly stitched up by Mr. Lister. 
He used a fine needle and silk, great care being taken to 
include in the stitches little except the peritoneal covering of 
the gut, and to invert the edges so that the serous surfaces 
were brought into apposition. The stitches were close to 
one another, and the suture was of the continuous kind. 
After the wounds had thus been closed, the silk was knotted, 
the ends cut off close to the knots, and the wounded intestine 
lightly returned. 
* ‘ Cooper on Hernia;’ part 1, ch. ii. 
* Travers, loc. cit., pp. 123 — 126. 
