Page:The Works of William Harvey (part 1 of 2).djvu/571

 of the history of generation in the deer employ the words uterus and horns of the uterus promiscuously.

In the human female, as I have said, the two tubes that arise near the cervix uteri and there perforate its cavity have no analogy to the parts generally called cornua, but, on the con- trary, in the mind of some anatomists, to the vasa spermatica. By others again they are called the spiramenta uteri the breathing tubes of the uterus ; and by others still they are called the vasa deferentia seu reservantia, as if they were of the same nature as the canals so designated in the male ; whilst they in fact correspond to the cornua of the uterus in other animals, as most clearly appears from their situation, connexion, length, perforation, general resemblance, and also office. For as many of the lower animals regularly conceive in the cornua uteri, so do women occasionally carry their conceptions in the cornu, or this tube, as the learned Riolanus 1 has shown from the obser- vations of others, and as we ourselves have found it with our own eyes.

These cornua terminate in a common cavity which, as stated, forms a kind of porch or vestibule to the uterus, and corresponds in the deer to the neck of the womb in women; in the same way as the tubes in question in the human female correspond to the cornua uteri in the deer. Now this name of cornua has been derived from the resemblance of the parts to the horns of an animal ; and in the same way as the horns of a goat or ram are ample at the base, arched and protuberant in front, and bent-in behind, *so are these horns of the uterus in the hind and doe capacious inferiorly, and taper gradually off superiorly, as they are reflected towards the spine. Further, as the horns of the animal are unequally tuberculated and uneven in front, but smooth behind, so are the horns of the uterus tuber- culated, as it were, and uneven, through the presence of cells, something like those of the colon, inferiorly and anteriorly; but superiorly, and on the aspect towards the spine, they are continuous and smooth, and present themselves secured and bound down by a ligamentous band ; they at the same time gradually decrease in size like horns. Did one take a piece of empty intestine, such as is used for making sausages, and draw-

1 Anthropologia, lib. ii, cap. 34.