In six months of non-action, the part played by an organ can be satisfactorily estimated. M. Mauclaire,[121] however, has put on record a case the history of which was longer. In 1902 he operated on a young woman and produced an artificial anus, there being no escape of fæcal matter by the ordinary channel. Ten months later M. Mauclaire operated a second time and shut off a portion of the intestine. He left the artificial anus, but cut across the lower end of the small intestine and inserted it near the iliac end of the descending colon (Fig. 19). For several days after the operation the fæces were passed by the normal aperture, as the small intestine now communicated directly with the large intestine, near the rectum. This condition, however, did not persist, for the fæcal matter began to flow back through the excluded portion of the large intestine, so reaching the artificial anus, and causing inconvenience. Giving up the hope that this would cease, M. Mauclaire performed a third operation twenty months later. He cut across the large intestine near the point where the small intestine had been artificially led into it (Fig. 20), so dividing the digestive tube into two parts, one of which remained in communication with the natural anus, whilst the other, consisting of nearly the whole of the large intestine, communicated with the exterior by the artificial anus. In the new state of affairs, the food refuse passed directly into the terminal portion of the large intestine, and thence, by way of the rectum, to the exterior through the normal anus without being able to pass up the large intestine towards the artificial anus. In this last operation about a yard of the small intestine and the greater part of the large intestine, the cæcum, and ascending, transverse and descending colons were removed from activity.