Note 15 — A TREATISE ON MIDWIFERY. (continued 2)

Smellie, p, 291. “When the head presents, and cannot be delivered by the labor-pains; when all the common methods have been used without success, the woman being exhausted, and all her efforts vain; and when the child cannot be delivered without such force as will endanger the life of the mother, because the head is too large, or the pelvis too narrow: it then becomes absolutely necessary to open the head, and extract with the hand, forceps, or crotchet. Indeed this last method formerly was the common practice when the child could not be easily turned, and is still in use with those who do not know how to save the child by delivery with the forceps: for this reason their chief care and study was to distinguish, whether the Fœtus was dead or alive; and as the signs were uncertain, the operation was often delayed until the woman was in the most imminent danger; or when it was performed sooner, the operator was frequently accused with rashness, on the supposition that the child might in time have been delivered alive by the labor-pains: perhaps he was sometimes conscious to himself, of the justice of this imputation, although what he had done was with an upright intention.”—This last indeed would be too uncharitable not to grant.