ON PHYSICKING HORSES 
383 
and its dependencies, into parts not accustomed to support the 
contact of all these substances, would have given rise to the most 
serious accidents, as haemorrhage, peritonitis, 8tc. 
Here, on the contrary, after the cessation of the pains by 
which parturition is usually announced, the ewe seems to enjoy, 
for awhile, the most perfect health. These circumstances, joined 
to the non-dilatation of the neck of the womb, and the absence of 
all discharge from the vagina, lead me to believe that the ges- 
tation was extra-uterine. 
The foetus, having arrived at its full development, of necessity 
died. It became a foreign body which Nature would get rid of 
by the means which she usually employs. 
Whatever be the fact, whether the foetus dies in the womb 
from which it cannot be expelled, or whether it perishes in the 
abdomen, whence it ought to have derived its growth, we see that 
Nature, all-powerful in the conservation of the mother, has, inde- 
pendent of the means of drying up or making a kind of petri- 
faction of the foetus, another contrivance that has not been al- 
luded to by any of our veterinary brethren, and which consists in 
the establishment of a depot , of which she makes most valuable 
use, on the surface of the abdomen, whether the foetus be or be 
not situated in the womb. 
Nature, however, in despite of all her efforts, would probably 
be unable to accomplish her purpose, and the mother and the 
offspring would perish, if man did not come to her aid, by ef- 
fecting an opening and enlarging the wound, and extracting the 
foetus ; avoiding, by other methodical treatment and diet, the 
accidents which might result from an incision into the abdominal 
parietes. 
Rec. de Med. Vet. Pratique , Janv. et Fev. 1842. 
ON PHYSICKING HORSES BY PROFESSIONAL AND 
UNPROFESSIONAL MEN, AND ON THE PAY- 
MENT FOR PROFESSIONAL ATTENDANCE. 
By Mr. E. A. Friend, Walsa/l. 
In my last communication to The Veterinarian, in at- 
tempting to display the evils attendant on bleeding, except under 
the direction of a skilful practitioner, I find that I have antici- 
pated the subject of the prize essay for veterinary surgeons for 
the present year. Whether the subject proposed has arisen out 
of that paper of mine, or was previously fixed upon, 1 do not 
