died at
Hammersmith, London. She was found dead in bed, and in a postmortem
examination, ordered to discover if possible the cause of death, there
was seen complete transposition of the viscera. The heart lay with its
base toward the left, its apex toward the right, reaching the lower
border of the 4th rib, under the right mamma. The vena cava was on the
left side and passed into the pulmonary cavity of the heart, which was
also on the left side, the aorta and systemic ventricle being on the
right. The left splenic vein was lying on the superior vena cava, the
liver under the left ribs, and the spleen on the right side underneath
the heart. The esophagus was on the right of the aorta, and the
location of the two ends of the stomach was reversed; the sigmoid
flexure was on the right side. Davis describes a similar instance in a
man.

Herrick mentions transposition of viscera in a man of twenty-five.
Barbieux cites a case of transposition of viscera in a man who was
wounded in a duel. The liver was to the left and the spleen and heart
to the right etc. Albers, Baron, Beclard, Boyer, Bull, Mackensie,
Hutchinson, Hunt, Murray, Dareste, Curran, Duchesne, Musser, Sabatier,
Shrady, Vulpian, Wilson, and Wehn are among others reporting instances
of transposition and inversion of the viscera.

Congenital extroversion or eventration is the result of some congenital
deficiency in the abdominal wall; instances are not uncommon, and some
patients live as long as do cases of umbilical hernia proper. Ramsey
speaks of entire want of development of the abdominal parietes.
Robertson, Rizzoli, Tait, Hamilton, Brodie, Denis, Dickie, Goyrand, and
many others mention extroversion of viscera from parietal defects. The
different forms of hernia will be considered in another chapter.

There seem to be no authentic cases of complete absence of the kidney
except in the lowest grades of monstrosities. Becker, Blasius, Rhodius,
Baillie, Portal, Sandifort, Meckel, Schenck, and Stoll are among the
older writers who have observed the absence of one kidney. In a recent
paper Ballowitz has collected 213 cases, from which the following
extract has been made by the British Medical Journal:--

"Ballowitz (Virchow's Archiv, August 5, 1895) has collected as far as
possible all the recorded cases of congenital absence of one kidney.
Excluding cases of fused kidney and of partial atrophy of one kidney,
he finds 213 cases of complete absence of one kidney,