The workes of that famous chirurgion Ambrose Parey translated out of Latin and compared with the French. by Tho: Johnson. Whereunto are added three tractates our of Adrianus Spigelius of the veines, arteries, & nerves, with large figures. Also a table of the bookes and chapters.

CHAP. XXIX. What the causes of difficult and painful travail in childe-birth are.

THe fault dependeth sometimes on the mother, and sometimes on the infant or child with∣in the womb. On the mother, if she be more fat, if she be given to gormanoize or great eating, if she be too lean or young, as Savanarola thinketh her to be, that is great with childe at nine years of age, or unexpert, or more old, or weaker then she should be either by nature or by some accident: as by diseases that she hath had a little before the time of childe-birth, or with a great flux of blood. But those that fall in travail before the full and prefix∣ed time are very difficult to deliver, because the fruit is yet unripe, and not ready or easie to be delivered. If the neck or orifice of the womb be narrow, either from the first conformation, or af∣terwards by some chance as by an ulcer cicatrized: or more hard and callous, by reason that it hath been torn before at the birth of some other childe, and so cicatrized again, so that if the cicatri∣zed place be not cut even in the moment of the deliverance, both the childe and the mother will be in danger of death; also the rude handling of the midwife may hinder the free deliverance of the childe. Oftentimes women are letted in travail by shamefac'tness, by reason of the presence of some man, or hate to some woman there present.

If the secundine be pulled away sooner then it is necessary, it may cause a great flux of blood to fill the womb, so that then it cannot perform his exclusive faculty, no otherwise then the blad∣der when it is distended by reason of over-abundance of water that is therein, cannot cast it forth, so that there is a stoppage of the urine. But the womb is much rather hindred, or the faculty of childe-birth is stopped or delayed, if together with the stopping of the secundine, there be either a Mole or some other body contrary to nature in the womb. In the secundines of two women whom I delivered of two children that were dead in their bodies, I found a great quantity of sird

like unto that which is found about the banks of rivers, so that the gravel or sand that was in each secundine was a full pound in weight.

Also the infant may be the occasion of difficult childe-birth, as, if too big, if it come over∣thwart, if it come with its face upwards, and its buttocks forwards, if it come with its feet and hands both forwards at once, it it be dead and swoun by reason of corruption, if it be monstrous, if it have two bodies or two heads, if it be manifold or seven-fold, as Allucrasis affirmeth he hath seen, if there be a mole annexed thereto, if it be very weak, if when the waters are stowed out, it doth not move nor stir, or offer its self to come forth. Yet notwithstanding, it happeneth sometimes that the fault is neither in the mother nor the childe, but in the air, which being cold, doth so binde, congeal and make stiff the genital parts, that they cannot be relaxed: or, being contrariwise too hot, it weakneth the woman that is in travail, by reason that it wasteth the spirits, wherein all the strength consisteth: or in the ignorant or unexpert midwife, who cannot artificially rule and govern the endeavors of the woman in travail.

The birth is wont to be easie, if it be in the due and prefixed natural time, if the childe offer himself lustily to come forth with his head forwards presently after the waters are come forth, and the mother in like manner lu••ty and strong: those which are wont to be troubled with very difficult childe-birth, ought a little before the time of the birth, to go into an half-tub filled with the decoction of mollifying roots and seeds, to have their genitals, womb and neck thereof to be annointed with much oyl, and the in testines that are full and loaded must be underburthened of the excrements, and then the expulsive faculty provoked with a sharp glyster, and the tumors and swelling of the birth concurring therewith, the more easie exclusion may be made. But I like it rather better, that the woman in travail should be placed in a chair that hath the back thereof leaning back-wards, then in her bed, but the chair must have a hole in the bottom, whereby the bones that must be dilated in the birth, may have more freedome to close themselves again.

Notes

• The causes of the difficult childe-birth that are in the woman that travaileth.
• The passions of the minde binder the birth.
• The causes of d fficult child-birth th••t are, in the infant.
• The ex••ernal causes of diffi∣cult childe-birth.
• Which is an easie birth. What causeth easiness of child-birth.