Observations on certain parts of the animal oeconomy. Inclusive of several papers from the Philosophical transactions, etc / by John Hunter ... With notes by Richard Owen.
- John Hunter
- Date:
- 1840
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Observations on certain parts of the animal oeconomy. Inclusive of several papers from the Philosophical transactions, etc / by John Hunter ... With notes by Richard Owen. Source: Wellcome Collection.
101/494 page 93
![ey gi zx “vs Wie + oy A oy ie Oh i} ait Pe Maat 32) A y iis ict A mee ” hastens 7. ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE PLACENTA. Tu connexion between the mother and fcetus in the human sub- ject, has in every age, in which science has been cultivated, called — forth the attention of the anatomist, the physiologist, and even the philosopher; but both that connexion, and the structure of the parts which form the connexion, were unknown till about the year 1754. The subject is certainly most interesting, and the discovery im- portant; and it is my intention, in the following pages, to give such an account of it as I hope may be acceptable to the public ;* while, at the same time, I establish my own claim to the discovery. But. that | may not seem to arrogate to myself more merit than I am entitled to, let me in justice to another person relate what follows. The late indefatigable Dr. MacKenzie, about the month of May, 1754, when assistant to Dr. Smellie, having procured the body of a pregnant woman, who died undelivered at the full term, had in- jected both the veins and arteries with particular success, the veins being filled with yellow, the arteries with red.t Having opened the abdomen, and exposed the uterus, he made an incision into the fore part, quite through its substance, and came which we examined, and which, as in Sir Everard Home’s case, had been subjected to the action of spirit, the chorion was semitransparent. In those mammalia, the fcetus, the ovum, when it has been detected unattached in the uterus, has invariably presented a translucency and delicacy of its membranes, with which the structure of the human ovum, as described by Home, is totally at variance ; and, from the tenor of the whole account, we believe the object to have been what Mr. Bauer, to whom its description and delineation were confided,® declared it to resemble, viz., the egg of an insect. ie Rejecting, then, the description we have just been considering,—and its apo- eryphal character is rightly admitted by all physiologists of the present day, who period of the passage of the human ovum into the uterus after impregnation, and its condition and structure when first received into that cavity, still remain open to the researches of the physiologist. ] time been given to the public, it was not published in the Philosophical Transac- tions. i + Dr. MacKenzie being then an assistant to the late Dr. Smellie, the procuring and dissecting this woman without Dr. Smellie’s knowledge was the cause of a separation between them, for the leading steps to such a discovery could not be Kept a secret. The winter following Dr. MacKenzie began to teach midwifery in the Borough of Southwark. 7 * “ As the ovum was so extremely small as to admit of dispute whether it was one or not, I carried it immediately to Kew, to Mr. Bauer, who, after examining it, said it looked like the egg of an insect.”— Phil. Trans., p, 255. Mr. Clift who laid open the uterus in question, and patiently scrutinized the whole of its cavity without perceiving any trace of an ovum, has always been of — opinion that the one afterwards detected by Home was dropped from one of the numerous flesh-flies which were buzzing about at the time of the examination.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33292292_0101.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
