Page:A descriptive catalogue of the Warren Anatomical Museum.djvu/599

 well as she ever did. In a few minutes, however, she was attacked with the usual symptoms, which, as above stated, were more severe than ever before, the swelling of the abdomen continuing for some weeks.

In the autumn of 1857, enlargement of the abdomen commenced without the precursor of an attack, and from that time it went on increasing ; but it was only during the last few months that it would have been noticed when she walked abroad. She lost flesh and a great deal of strength ; but she was able to do some work as a tailoress, was never confined to her bed, and walked out within three or four weeks of her death, which occurred in Dec., 1858. There never was any return of the general pains, and over the abdomen her only complaint was of a sense of weight. The appetite was good t to the last, except during the attacks ; bowels generally well ; urine scanty and turbid. (Edema of feet for the last two months. An hour or two only before her death she said that she felt very sick, but made no especial complaint, and had then only just left her sitting-room. She was never tapped.

On dissection, the peritoneal cavity contained, by esti- mate, six or seven gallons of a very viscid substance, that was compared, at the time, to soft soap. A stout, muscu- lar man, who was in the habit of lifting heavy weights, undertook to remove the -tub that contained this substance, but found it too heavy ; and on setting it down, said that he should estimate the weight at 200 Ibs. In the place of the left ovary, was a mass of disease that appeared very satisfactorily to consist of a cyst about as large as the two fists. This cyst had been lacerated throughout the greater, part of its extent ; the edges of the laceration apparently cicatrized, and being quite distinct. Its interior was made up of cysts, generally from 2 to 4 lines in diameter ; and from it there hung off a secretion which was somewhat clear, but altogether too viscid to be removed without great diffi- culty. The serous surface of the cyst had, in some parts, a dark-brown discoloration ; and, in others, a brilliantly glistening and silvery appearance, which Dr. Ellis found to be owing to cholesterine. The spleen was quite small, and the investing membrane thickened and opaque, with

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