eighth day, after a marvelous recovery, she was
able to drive to the Royal Berkshire Hospital, a distance of five
miles. At the time of report, two years and six months after the
mutilation, she was in perfect health. Walters looked into the
statistics of such cases and found 36 accidental removals of the uterus
in the puerperium with 14 recoveries. All but three of these were
without a doubt attended by previous inversion of the uterus.

A medical man was tried for manslaughter in 1878 because he made a
similar mistake. He had delivered a woman by means of the forceps, and,
after delivery, brought away what he thought a tumor. This "tumor"
consisted of the uterus, with the placenta attached to the fundus, the
funis, a portion of the lateral ligament, containing one ovary and
about three inches of vagina. The uterus was not inverted. A horrible
case, with similar results, happened in France, and was reported by
Tardieu. A brutal peasant, whose wife was pregnant, dragged out a fetus
of seven months, together with the uterus and the whole intestinal
canal, from within 50 cm. of the pylorus to within 8 cm. of the
ileocecal valve. The woman was seen three-quarters of an hour after the
intestines had been found in the yard (where the brute had thrown
them), still alive and reproaching her murderer. Hoffman cites an
instance in which a midwife, in her anxiety to extract the afterbirth,
made traction on the cord, brought out the uterus, ovaries, and tubes,
and tore the vulva and perineum as far as the anus.

Woodson tells the story of a negress who was four months pregnant, and
who, on being seized with severe uterine pains in a bath, succeeded in
seizing the fetus and dragging it out, but inverting the uterus in the
operation. There is a case recorded of a girl of eighteen, near her
labor, who, being driven from her house by her father, took refuge in a
neighboring house, and soon felt the pains of child-birth. The
accoucheur was summoned, pronounced them false pains, and went away. On
his return he found the girl dying, with her uterus completely inverted
and hanging between her legs. This unfortunate maiden had been
delivered while standing upright, with her elbows on the back of a
chair. The child suddenly escaped, bringing with it the uterus, but as
the funis ruptured the child fell to the floor. Wagner pictures partial
prolapse of the womb in labor.

It would too much extend this chapter to include the many accident