Treatise on midwifery and the diseases of women and children with remedies / by A. I. Coffin.

  • Coffin, A. I., (Albert Isaiah), approximately 1790-1866.
Date:
1878
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Treatise on midwifery and the diseases of women and children with remedies / by A. I. Coffin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    the weiglit above eight ounces ; but the foetus does not then amount to three ounces; at six months the foetus weighs twelve or thirteen ounces, and the placenta and membrane only seven or eight; at eight mouths the foetus weighs some- thing more than five pounds, and the ovum little more than one pound ; at birth, the child weighs from six to nine pounds, which it I'arely exceeds ; but the placenta seldom increases much in bulk from the seventh month. Having given the above description, we shall next take a short view of the germ. It is the opinion of some, that all the parts of an animal exist in the germ, though their extreme minute- ness and fluidity for some time conceal them from our sight. In a state of progression, some ai*e much earlier seen than others. The embryo, in its original state, is probably entirely fibrous and nervous ; and these fibrous parts seem to contain, in a small scale, all the others which are after- wards to be finally evolved. Of the fibrous, the heart and liver ; of the nervous, the brain and spinal chord. The head and its appendages first appear ; then the viscera of the chest; next the abdominal; at length the extremities gradually shoot out, the superior first, then the inferior, and by slow and invisible gradation, the beautiful and admirable structure of the whole complicated system is evolved. The foetus at four weeks is nearly the size of a common fly, it is soft, muci- laginous, seems to hang by its belly, and its bowels are only covered with a transparent mem- brane. At six weeks the consistence is still
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