“All still-born children should be considered as only apparently dead, and the resuscitative process ought never to be neglected. Sometimes two hours or more will elapse before reanimation can be effected. An ingenious man-midwife, says Bruhier, was employed for several hours in the revival of an apparently still-born child, and as his endeavours proved unavailing, he considered the subject really dead. Being, however, accidentally detained, he again turned his attention to the child, and by continuing the resuscitative method for some time it was unexpectedly restored to life” (p. 150). The following is one of Struve’s most striking cases:-- A Mr. E.---- called in 18---- to obtain a certificate of death for a still-born child of seven months’ gestation. Arriving at the house, the doctor found the child laid upon a little straw and covered with a slight black shawl; this was one p.m., and the child had been there since five a.m. It was icy cold, and there was no heart sound nor respiration, but there was a slight muscular twitching over the region of the heart. The child was immersed in a hot bath and artificial respiration employed, but for twenty minutes the case seemed hopeless; then the eyes opened and after continued effort the respirations began, laborious and interrupted at first, then normal by degrees. The child was saved, and became an accomplished violinist. The mortality and waste of infant life, particularly in large cities like Paris, London, Berlin, Vienna, and New York, is admitted by all investigators to be enormous. In France medical writers, in view of the small percentage of births to population, are waking up to the realisation that the State cannot afford the loss, and that, among other things, steps should be taken to resuscitate the still-born, so that none should be buried before unequivocal signs of death are manifested.[21] The premature abandonment of the still-born among the poorer classes in crowded cities is only too probable. There are also cases recorded which show a corresponding risk to infants who have survived their birth:--