Hydramnios, or an excessive quantity of _liquor amnii,_ may so distend the uterus as to cause grave danger to maternal life, and if the child is viable the uterus should be emptied. Intrauterine hemorrhage brought on by a premature separation of the placenta is a very dangerous condition: 32 to 50 per centum of the mothers die, and 85 to 94 per centum of the children. In a marked hemorrhage the only way to save the mother is to empty the uterus, so that it may contract and thus close the patulous vessels. Placenta praevia is a placenta implanted in the neighbourhood of the internal os of the uterine neck. This is a very perilous condition, calling for the induction of premature labour. The medical treatment is artificial abortion as soon as the condition is diagnosed in any stage of gestation; but this is, of course, in conflict with the decrees of the Holy Office. Under expectant treatment about 40 per centum of {54} the mothers die, and 66 per centum of the children. Those children that are born alive commonly die within ten days after delivery. The great foetal mortality is due to premature birth and asphyxiation. Skilful obstetricians get much better results, but skilful obstetricians are unfortunately rare. When the grave complications enumerated above occur in the early months of pregnancy, before the foetus is viable, the Catholic physician, since by the natural law and the decisions of the Holy Office he is forbidden to induce artificial abortion, must withdraw from the case. If there is no other physician to attend to the woman, he must let her die. He can not withdraw without explanation, and in many cases the explanation of the condition will promptly result in the calling in of a physician who has no scruple in inducing this abortion, no matter how reputable he may be. The universal medical doctrine is to induce abortion in cases where abortion will save the mother's life and the foetus is "too young to amount to anything." This is looked upon as legitimate abortion by the very best men that do not recognise the authority of the Holy Office: they deem the position of the Catholic physician in these cases as altogether erroneous, or even criminal. The position of the Catholic moralists on craniotomy has turned the attention of many non-Catholic physicians to the immorality of the act, which formerly was deemed entirely permissible. Probably the same good result will be effected in the matter of abortion. AUSTIN ÓMALLEY. {55} THE CAESAREAN SECTION AND CRANIOTOMY In the caesarean section the infant is delivered through an incision in the abdominal or uterine walls. The operation, according to one opinion, takes its name from Caius Julius Caesar, who, it is said, was brought into the world in this manner, _"a caeso matris utero"_; this, however, is a myth.