STRICTURE OF THE OS AND CERVIX UTERI. 717 
To operate by incision for stricture of the os and cervix 
uteri in a case where there is any actual disease present would 
he, to say the least, very ambiguous practice, and only ad¬ 
missible as a dernier ressort. 
1 believe the veterinary practitioner can scarcely meet with 
a more tantalising case than one of stricture of os and cervix 
uteri, whether simple or complicated. I happen to know of 
three cases of stricture which occurred during last winter 
season, where the professional gentleman called in refused to 
do anything, and allowed the patients to die. 
Having made these prefatory remarks, I now proceed to 
give the details of a few cases of stricture in which I operated 
by incision. 
Case 1 . —I was called very late one night during last 
spring to a black horned seven-year-old cow, which was said 
to have been twenty-four hours in calving; ee water off, but 
her calf bed was not open /” On arriving at the place, some 
three miles off, I found that a cannie man had been doing his 
utmost to calve the cow for some five hours, but had only 
succeeded in getting one finger through the os uteri. The 
cow had pretty severe pains, and on examination I found the 
entrance to the uterus quite rigid and firmly contracted, admit¬ 
ting with extreme difficulty two of my fingers. The os uteri 
partook of the contraction, but seemed quite soft; behind the 
os, however, in the cervix, there were three successive trans¬ 
verse bands,' each completely encircling the passage exceed¬ 
ingly firm and unyielding. They were very hard and quite 
smooth to the feel, but after the most powerful exertions refused 
to yield a hairbreadth ! What was to be done ? 
I at once resolved to cut through these apparently car¬ 
tilaginous rings. As the os uteri could not be got far 
enough down into the vaginal passage to be seen and mani¬ 
pulated externally, cutting through the contracted cervix 
came to be rather a difficult matter and required extreme 
caution in doing. I succeeded, however, in getting a par¬ 
tially covered knife introduced into the contracted parts and 
made two side incisions “ up and out ” through the three har¬ 
dened transverse bands of the cervix. The effect was won¬ 
derful, the whole parts relaxing almost instantly and the 
forelegs of a foetus made their way into the vagina, but it 
required considerable traction to get the head and subse¬ 
quently the whole body. There were twins present. Both 
were born alive and did well. Very little assistance was 
required in bringing the second calf away. 
There was scarcely any haemorrhage after the operation, 
and the cow recovered nicely, merely getting the vaginal and 
