Pelvic cellulitis generally develops itself in an acute form, and the symptoms are very similar to those of pelvic peritonitis, and, like the latter affection, there is always an exudation of inflammatory material in these cases, so that the meshes of the tissues become soaked like a sponge with water. The invasion of the infection is usually signalized by a distinct chill or rigors followed by an increased bodily temperature and a correspondingly rapid pulse. The commencement of a parametritis is not often without distinct symptoms that affect the nervous system. The patient feels uncomfortably depressed, a tired, worn-out feeling overcomes her, she loses her appetite, and there is pain in the pelvic cavity. This pain is partly due to an accompanying peritoneal irritation, or in some cases to a circumscribed inflammation of the peritoneum. Often the pain runs down the groin, along the course of the great vessels and nerves; this is occasioned from the exudation pressing on the trunks of these structures in the pelvis. Pain in the small of the back, and painful defecation, with an irritable bladder, are due to the same cause. Phlegmasia alba dolens, or what was called before the dawn of modern pathological science, _milk leg_, is only another form or a complication of pelvic cellulitis. This occurs where the infectious inflammatory process runs along the cellular or connective tissue of the large vessels and nerves, to the connective tissue of the thighs; this is a very easy matter, because the vessels and nerves are imbedded in cellular tissue, and as the vessels leave the pelvis at the groin, this tissue is continuous with that of the extremities. When the inflammation gets into the thighs, it invades either the subcutaneous cellular tissue, that is, the connective tissue under the skin, or it runs along the trunks of the nerves and vessels; the affected limb becomes then edematous or swollen, hence the vague term of milk leg, because the milk has never anything to do with it. One time it was supposed that this affection is only possible after confinement, but this is an error, because phlegmasia alba may develop at any time from purulent infection, originating from any cause. The so-called puerperal or childbed fever is also nothing more nor less than an infection of purulent secretion.