VETERINARY OBSTETRICS. 
447 
dozen farmers had tried their ee experience” and failed—did all 
that science and art could suggest. He had amputated one 
fore extremity, but failed to remove the other, and therefore 
recommended the mare to be destroyed, but a relation of 
Mr. Hutchinson having seen Mr. Taylor’s case, advised my 
being sent for. On my arrival I found the case as I have 
stated above ; the parts were so dry, and so great was the con¬ 
traction of the uterus, that I found it impossible to ascertain 
the correct position of the head. It required immense force 
to pass the arm at all, and so tight did the uterus grip, that 
in a few minutes my arm was rendered useless. From the 
swollen state of the parts, the violence of the throes, and the 
excited state of the animal, I concluded that it was a hopeless 
case, and therefore recommended the poor animal to be put out 
of her sufferings at once; only, however, a few hours sooner 
than she would have died, had I been brutal enough to cut 
away piecemeal the foetus, and to see her sink either during 
the operation, or a few hours after it, to gain a little 
popularity from the incompetent judges who were present, 
at the expense of an honorable and upright member of our 
profession. 
Here are two cases, to the uninformed alike, where one 
practitioner gains a great deal of praise, but deserves none. 
Any other member of the profession could and would have 
delivered Mr. Taylor’s mare as easily as myself, it was an ex¬ 
ceptional case—I was never so fortunate as to meet with 
one like it, either before or since—but I do not believe it 
was possible for any man to have saved the life of the mare 
in the second case, unless he had been present before, or at 
the time the membranes became ruptured; yet the practi¬ 
tioner was condemned as a bungler, because he could not 
accomplish an impossible task. 
In conclusion, I wish to offer a few remarks on the com¬ 
munications in your November and June numbers, signed 
by “ Andrew Galley.” I think no member of the profession 
can read these letters without arriving at the conclu¬ 
sion that they are the production of a partisan, written for 
the express purpose of damaging the professional reputation 
of a member of the corporate body, and as such will be con¬ 
demned by ninety-nine out of every hundred in the pro¬ 
fession south of the Tweed. Had the discussion of the 
case been confined to your pages, we could have understood 
the matter better, and would have been charitable enough to 
have supposed the presumed author to be animated with a 
desire to obtain information from the profession—of which he 
