The Womb.--the plate beautifully and effectively illustrates the location and formation of the womb, that wonderful organ which performs the function of parturition, and which is so constructed as to assist in all the necessary efforts of birth. Its structure is elastic and strong, and it expands readily to accommodate the growth of the child (fœtus). While this is true exteriorly, its inner parts are rather delicately lined, and subject to a variety of painful diseases, generally designated as "Diseases of the Womb."

At this point, the author or authors just couldn't help themselves and a return to some of their previous form.

First off it like to point out the use of the word parturition. This word simply means the act of giving birth.

Second, I'd like to point out the atypical spelling of the word fetus, spelled as "fœtus.” I have wonder if the use of the spelling using the Greek characters “œ” was used to describe the fetus from a secular perspective while being very respectable of nonsecular concerns and sensibilities. The etymology of the word is actually theoretically linked to a spelling mistake by Saint Isidore of Seville, who introduced Aristotle to his countrymen around between 535 ad and 636 ad in his work the Etymologiae (taking its title from the method he used in the transcription of his era's knowledge). He may not have been a travelpro but he was well learned. He brought ancient knowledge back into Western knowledge as early as the beginning of the Dark Ages.

Third, the last phrase of this section "Diseases of the Womb" seems to hint to me, and my perspective may be flawed, that the author is referring to illnesses often associated with women, but downplayed by doctors hundred years ago. They lump the large number of health issues together at times it did not take practical nor realistic look at it as they were avoiding the sensibility issues of the day.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• Great Value and Beauty of the Plate
  
  

  Great Value and Beauty of the Plate.–We can understand much of this wonderful process. We have looked into the stomach, watched its peculiar actions and traced its various steps, from which the scientist is capable, in his laboratory of knives, mortars, baths, chemicals and filters, of imitating many of the operations of digestion; but just at the moment he thinks himself most successful, he is compelled to pause.  At the threshold of that “one step more,” which Fontenelle required, “and he would surprise nature herself,” he stops, and very wisely, without concealment of his designs, admires, then wonders, and finally worships with all the reverence of his soul.

   

  After reading that diatribe, I have to honestly say I have no idea what the author is talking about.  The other seems beyond some strange sort of rant about science, scientists in the digestive system.  Unfortunately he’s ranting on a bunch of nonsense almost sound like he’s talking about Frankenstein’s monster.  One things for sure I’m glad that I didn’t take a class instructed by this writer.  If this book is that hard to understand from sheer gibberish, I can just imagine what’ll lecture would be like.

  I don’t think this has so much to do with the difference in the decades of the century even.  This seems to be more of an issue of an author suffering from the ability to provide a clear thought and written format.  It’s almost like listening to Charlie Brown’s teacher lecture on real estate over the telephone in a Peanuts cartoon.

  WAh wah wah wah , wu wah . . . .

   

  This entry seems to reaffirm my belief that this author got paid by the word and not by the concept of thought.

• Typhoid Fever from Polluted Water
  
  

  Typhoid Fever from Polluted Water. — the remarks which have been already made with regard to the influence of impure water on the spread of cholera, apply still with greater force to the causation of typhoid fever. So, does this move propagation that the assertion may be ventured that few readers of these pages have not lost some near relative or beloved friend from the dreaded disease arising in this way, although the true source of the infection was perhaps, at the time it occurred, quite unsuspected.

  Okay so if you have been following this recent series on typhoid fever and cholera, the general theme here is that polluted water and contaminants brought to water sources were extremely dangerous for what we would consider civilization just a hundred years ago.  It might be a little bit more difficult to picture something of an epidemic raging through London or New York City today.  However you might consider just how fragile ecosystems of the city’s are today.  They rely on massive systems to clean the water.  If power to those systems were to fail for an extended period of time, the spread of disease could rapidly start up with population centers at levels that are much higher than they ever were one hundred years ago.

  There is only so much that any government agency or even the military for that matter can do to potentially help in a situation like that.  We have recently seen what happened in New Orleans were a population of just one million people were essentially left behind.  That occurred during a flood after a hurricane, and so there were aspects of that situation that definitely complicated things.

  However, if we consider just how big of a failure a given city might experience when it has a population of several million people in it, things could be much more dangerous.  I’m not just talking about the potential for riots and looting, and the necessary levels of police forces, National Guard, and other members needed to come in and secure the area.  I’m talking about the need of infrastructure and support systems necessary to keep the city functioning.

  A possible better example of a complete breakdown of the system, could probably be evidenced in the failure that took hold in Baghdad following the invasion of US troops.  Not only did the system fail from a water supply and electricity supply perspective, but the residents took to sabotaging and looting some of the equipment that made those systems work.

  We often times here about how the military was unprepared for that particular situation, and we think about soldiers going into battle without the proper Kevlar vests, or armor plating on Humvees or even little things like replacement Kevlar helmets, or 5.11 Tactical Knives, or night vision goggles.  We don’t always think about the fact that they don’t go into a city armed with plumbers and engineers, and plumbers and engineers at levels large enough to actually run the city.

  So as we look back on this historical accounting of the perils of these diseases, we should not make the mistake of thinking, that this could not happen to us.  It is very possible that we are only a few days of electricity away from being reduced to a similar state or level of technology needed to protect us.  In Zimbabwe it actually took a couple years, as the President of that country systematically dismantled his country with one failed policy after the next, but we have also seen a President in the United States, whose bad policies have similarly brought an even larger more successful country down, it might not be impossible for a different President to finish the job.

  

  Technorati tags: Cholera Possible in America, Cholera New York City, Lessons Learned from Bagdad, Government Unprepared
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• Values of the Plates
  
  

  THE DIGESTIVE APPARATUS AND ITS WONDERS

  Values of the Plates.  — seeing is believing; nay, it is more, it is knowing and remembering.  The mere reading of his statement on any particular subject is not always advance our knowledge of the matter in question.  The observation of the facts, or its proper illustration by appropriate diagrams, such as we observed these anatomical charts to be, not only emphasizes the point considered, but aides us and remembering the principal features connected with the functions performed, does advancing our knowledge of the subject discussed, and educational progress is made.

  _________________

  In this section the author is referring to the medical charts and diagrams that come with the book.  This is actually an interesting excerpt.  I’m sure it was a bit of conventional wisdom that combining pictures with text would help people understand and learn.  Today I work in part as a MindManager trainer.  My manager is a software program that enables people to mind map on their computer.  My maps enable people to put text in words and pictures and colors together so that they can learn and digest the topic faster.  The interesting thing is in the 1960s a scientist won a Nobel peace prize for putting all that information together in proving that people do learn better when they look at pictures and colors as opposed to just flat black text.  I’m sure the monks of the dark ages could’ve probably confirm that, but it hadn’t gone to the scientific process yet.