[39] "It is a common notion, that the brute enjoys great advantages, compared with woman, in the act of parturition, from the position and configuration of its pelvis. Is not this groundless? In the first place it is said that the oblique axis of the brim, in woman, is less favourable to the descent of the foetal head than the axis of the brim in the brute, which is parallel with the spine. But the physiologist knows, that ordinarily in woman, just before the commencement of the labour pains, the uterus slowly, and without pain, descends by a mechanism, which Sir C. Bell has so beautifully described in his memoir on the muscularity of that organ; and that thus a small segment of the foetal head becomes engaged in the brim, and in the position most favourable for passing, before the uterine pains commence. The truth is, the obliquity of the axis of the brim is, in general, _no disadvantage or impediment whatever_. In the second place, it is urged, that the great size of the human foetal head occasions incomparably more difficulty than the sharp-pointed, small head of the brute foetus. For this there is equally no foundation. The size and figure of the human brim are as well fitted to give passage to the large head of the child, as the brim of the brute pelvis to allow the entrance of the comparatively smaller head of the foetal brute, &c., &c. Still looking at the figure of the human foetus, and comparing it with that of the foetal brute, some may be inclined to imagine, notwithstanding what has been said, that the brute will pass with far greater facility than the child; such was my own opinion till I subjected the point to the test of experiment. We are not to think, but to try, as John Hunter advises," &c.--_Roberton, Physiology, &c._, p. 247. [40] _L'Histoire General des Voyages._ [41] "During pregnancy the squaw continues her usual avocations, and, even in its most advanced state, she neither bears a lighter burthen on her back, nor walks a shorter distance in a day, than she otherwise would. If on a march she feels the pains of parturition, she retires to the bushes, throws her burthen from her back, and, without any aid, brings the infant into the world. After washing in water, if at hand, or in melted snow, both herself and the infant, she immediately replaces the burthen upon her back (weighing, perhaps, between sixty and one hundred pounds), secures her child upon the top of it, protected from the cold by an envelope of bison robe, and thus hurries on to overtake her companions."--_James' Narrative of Expedition from Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains._