The medical evidence relative to the duration of human pregnancy, given in the Gardner peerage cause, before the Committee for Privileges of the House of Lords in 1825-6 : with introductory remarks and notes / by Robert Lyall.

Great Britain. Parliament. House of Lords. Committee for Privileges

Date:: 1826

Credit: The medical evidence relative to the duration of human pregnancy, given in the Gardner peerage cause, before the Committee for Privileges of the House of Lords in 1825-6 : with introductory remarks and notes / by Robert Lyall. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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$merit of Dr. Hunter, who was deceased, to put questions by way of cross-examination. The counsel were informed, that they might ask what were the opinions of eminent men. {Mr. Tindal.) Do you not know it was the opinion of Dr, Hunter, that a woman may be brought to bed after the lapse of ten calendar months from the time of conception?—I believe Dr. Hunter never taught that doctrine.. He may have adverted to cases in which such circumstances were represented to him ; but if I recollect rightly. Dr, Hunter never taught that doctrine. Am I to understand you to say he did not state that?—Not as his opinion, I believe I may say*. Are there not some names of authors which are well received, and upon whom reliance is placed in their profession, who have taught a contrary doctrine to that you are now stating, namely, that the time may be longer?—I may refer to Haller, who perhaps stood as high as a physician, in his time, as any other, perhaps higher ; and w’ho is considered a most respectable authority, as high an authority as can be had u])on such a subject; and I believe Haller states forty weeks to be the period. Have you not learnt from books of authority, that the time of gestation of a mother may be longer than the period you have re- presented ?—Certainly ; it is stated so in the Book of Moses; but when my own experience is opposed to such a statement, I would certainly give, for the advantage of persons, the result of my own experience, rather than I would offer the Mosaic opinion to guide them in their arrangements. 'rhe question did not refer to so early an authority as Moses, but one more within the reach of our own times ; cannot you refer to any practitioners of eminence, within the last two centuries, who have thought the same opinion ?—Not that a woman goes ten months f. Not that she may go ten months?—Not as his opinion ; certainly not. Does not a very ancient author, and one to whose name one always pays the greatest deference, Hippocrates, lay down that it may be a longer time than ten months ?—Hippocrates mentions ten months; and I believe the expression to be, rvvri (pvet Sexa p.i}vos tero To fi.ax^oTa.tov. Have the goodness to tell me the nature of the months he would reckon by?—I am not prepared to answer that question. * Many parts of this evidence are printed in Italics, on purpose to point out their importance to the reader: sometimes they are extraordinary; sometimes contradictory; sometimes ridiculous; and at other times they are expressed in forcible language. Vide subsequent notes. t_We were a good deal surprised by this statement, but as the subject mat- ter is sufficiently alluded to hereafter, we may here simply remark, that the opinion, that a woman may go more than ten calendar months, is mentioned by many distinguished men, and believed by many living practitioners of eminence. Vide subsequent notes.$