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Rh helped by the pragmatical interferences of meddlesome midwives.

Throughout the 19th century midwifery continued to advance, gynaecology grew into a special department with an extensive literature, the mechanism of labour developed under the clinical observations of men like Nägele and the study of such frozen sections of cadavera as were made by Braune, the indications for interference became more clear and the methods of interference more simple and safe, and a whole realm of antenatal pathology and teratology was added to the domain of science, while practitioners learned the art of saving premature and delicate infants by the use of the incubator and proper alimentation. Every advance in all the cognate sciences was appreciated and applied for the advancement of obstetrics. But there are two achievements which will make the 19th century for ever memorable in the annals of midwifery—the abolition of the pains of labour and the arrest laid on mortality from the so-called puerperal fever. In February 1847 Sir J. Y. Simpson, choosing a case where he had to deliver by turning, put the patient asleep with ether. Seeing that the uterine contractions continued, though the attendant pain was abolished, he proceeded to administer ether in cases of natural labour, and in November of the same year demonstrated the virtues of chloroform, and so furnished the most serviceable anaesthetic, not only to the obstetrician in the lying-in room, but to the surgeon on the battlefield, and to the general practitioner in his everyday work. Ignaz Philipp Semmelweiss, assistant in the maternity hospital of Vienna, was struck and saddened with the appalling mortality that attended the delivery of the women under his care, as many as one (in some months three) out of every ten of the puerperae being carried out dead. He observed that the mortality was much higher in the wards allotted to the tuition of students than in those set apart for the training of nurses. In the spring of 1847 he saw at the post-mortem examination of a young colleague who had died of a poisoned wound, that the appearances were the same as he had too often had occasion to see at the post-mortem examinations of his puerperae. He ordered that every student who assisted a woman in her labour must first wash his hands in a disinfectant solution of chloride of lime, and in 1848 already the mortality was less in the students’ than it was in the nurses’ wards. Thus the first light was shed on the nature of the mischief of which multitudes of puerperal patients perished, and the first intelligent step was taken to lessen the mortality. When, some twenty years later, Lister had applied the bacteriological principles of Pasteur with beneficent results to surgery, obstetricians gladly followed his lead, and the 19th century beheld added to the comfort of anaesthetic midwifery the confidence of midwifery antiseptic and even aseptic.

 OCALA (a Seminole word for green or fertile land), a city and the county-seat of Marion county, Florida, U.S.A., in the N. central part of the state, about 100 m. S.W. of Jacksonville. Pop. (1900) 3380, (1905) 4493, of whom 2467 were negroes, (1910) 4370. It is served by the Seabord Air Line and the Atlantic Coast Line railways. About 6 m. E. is Silver Spring, the largest and best known of the springs of Florida. Its basin is circular, about 600 ft. in diameter; it is about 65 ft. in depth, and its waters are remarkable for their transparency and refractive powers. According to the estimate of Dr D. G. Brinton, the spring discharges more than 300,000,000 gallons of water daily, its outflow forming what is known as Silver Spring Run, 9 m. long, emptying into the Oklawaha river and navigable by small river steamers. For the drainage and sewerage of the city a subterranean river whose source and mouth are unknown is utilized. The city is the seat of the Emerson Memorial and Industrial Home (Methodist Episcopal) for negro girls. Ocala was settled in 1845, but its development dates from 1880, when it was first chartered as a city. In December 1890 it was the meeting-place of the National Convention of the Farmers'

Alliance, which promulgated a statement of political principles generally known as the “Ocala Platform.” (See .)  OCAÑA, a town of central Spain, in the province of Toledo; on the extreme north of the tableland known as the Mesa de Ocaña, with a station on the railway from Aranjuez to Cuenca. Pop. (1900) 6616. The town is surrounded by ruined walls, and in it are the remains of an old castle. In one of its parish churches is the chapel of Nuestra Señora de los Remedios, in which Ferdinand and Isabella were married in 1469. Ocaña is the Vicus Cuminarius of the Romans, and was the dowry that El Motamid of Seville gave his daughter Zaida on her marriage with Alphonso VI. of Castile (1072–1109). Near Ocaña, on the 19th of November 1809, the Spanish under their Irish general Lacy were routed by the French under Joseph Bonaparte and Marshal Soult.  OCARINA, a wind instrument invented in Italy, which must be classed with musical toys or freaks, although concerted music has been written for it. The ocarina consists of an earthenware vessel in the shape of an egg with a pointed base and a tube like a spout in the side, which contains the mouthpiece. There are usually 10 holes in the front surface of the instrument, nine for fingers and thumb and a vent hole; the newer models have 8 holes and two keys. By half covering the holes the semitones are obtained.  O’CAROLAN (or ), TURLOGH (1670–1738), Irish bard, son of John O’Carolan, a farmer, was born at Newtown, near Nobber, in the county of Meath. The family is said to have belonged to the sept of MacBradaigh, and the bard's great-grandfather was a chieftain. The O’Carolans forfeited their estates during the civil wars, and Turlogh’s father settled at Alderford, Co. Roscommon, on the invitation of the family of M'Dermott Roe. In his eighteenth year he became blind from smallpox. He received special instruction in music, and used to wander with his harp round the houses of the surrounding gentry, mainly in Connaught. The famous song Receipt for Drinking may be responsible for the allegation that he was addicted to intemperate drinking, but Charles O’Conor (1710–1791), the antiquary, who had personal knowledge of him, gives him a good character in private life. The number of Carolan’s musical pieces, to nearly all of which he composed verses, is said to exceed two hundred. He died on the 25th March 1738, and was buried at Kilronan.

 OCCAM, WILLIAM OF (d. c. 1349), English schoolman, known as Doctor invincibilis and Venerabilis inceptor, was born in the village of Ockham, Surrey, towards the end of the 13th century. Unattested tradition says that the Franciscans persuaded him while yet a boy to enter their order, sent him to Merton College, Oxford (see G. C. Brodrick, Memorials of Merton College, p. 194), and to Paris, where he was first the pupil, afterwards the successful rival, of Duns Scotus. He probably left France about 1314, and there are obscure traces of his presence in Germany, in Italy, and in England during the following seven years. It has generally been held that in 1322 he appeared as the provincial of England at the celebrated assembly of the Franciscan order at Perugia, and that there he headed the revolt of the Franciscans against Pope John XXII.; but, according to Little (English Historical Review, vi. 747), the provincial minister on this occasion was William of Nottingham. Probably, however, Occam was present at the assembly. His share in this revolt resulted in his imprisonment, on the charge of heresy, for seventeen weeks in the dungeons of the papal palace at Avignon. He and his companions—Michael of Cesena, general of the order, and Bonagratia—managed to escape, and found their way to Munich, where they aided Louis IV. or V. (q.v.) of Bavaria in his long contest with the papal curia. It was for Occam’s share in this controversy that he was best known in his lifetime. Michael of Cesena