And to all these various difficulties there is oftentimes one more, and
that is, the ignorance of the midwife, who for want of understanding in
her business, hinders nature in her work instead of helping her.
Having thus looked into the cause of hard labour, I will now show the
industrious midwife how she may minister some relief to the labouring
woman under these difficult circumstances. But it will require judgment
and understanding in the midwife, when she finds a woman in difficult
labour, to know the particular obstruction, or cause thereof, that so a
suitable remedy may be applied; as for instance, when it happens by the
mother's being too young and too narrow, she must be gently treated, and
the passages anointed with oil, hog's lard, or fresh butter, to relax
and dilate them the easier, lest there should happen a rupture of any
part when the child is born; for sometimes the peritoneum breaks, with
the skin from the privities to the fundament.
But if the woman be in years with her first child, let her lower parts
be anointed to mollify the inward orifice, which in such a case being
more hard and callous, does not easily yield to the distention of
labour, which is the true cause why such women are longer in labour, and
also why their children, being forced against the inward orifice of the
womb (which, as I have said, is a little callous) are born with great
bumps and bruises on their heads.
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