The above facts would seem sufficiently wonderful. There are others, however, of the same nature still more so. In some instances, the product of the second conception, instead of developing independently of the first, has become attached to it, and the phenomenon has been presented of the growth of a child within a child—a fœtus within a fœtus. Such a singular occurrence has been lately recorded in a German journal. A correspondent of the Dantzic Gazette states that on Sunday, February 1, 1869, at Schliewen, near Dirschau, 'a young and blooming shepherd's wife was delivered of a girl, otherwise sound, but having on the lower part of her back, between the hips, a swelling as big as two good-sized fists, through the walls of which a well-developed fœtus may be felt. Its limbs indicate a growth of from five to six months, and its movements are very lively. The father called in the health commissioner, Dr. Preuss, from Dirschau, and begged him to remove the swelling together with the fœtus. The doctor, however, after a careful examination, declared that there was a possibility in this extraordinary case of the child within the swelling coming to fruition. Its existence and active motions were palpable to all present. No physician could be justified in destroying this marvelous being. It ought rather to be protected and cherished. The new-born girl, notwithstanding her strange burden, is of unusual strength and beauty, and takes the breast very cheerfully.'
We find something further in regard to this singular birth in the Weser Zeitung of February 20, 1869. It quotes from the Dantzic Gazette some remarks by the health commissioner, Dr. Preuss of Dirschau, in which the doctor declares the facts contained in the report given above to be correct. He was summoned on the 1st of February to the child, and saw the vigorous movements, and felt the members of a fœtus within the swelling, as described. It was evidently a double creation. The case thus far, though rare, is not unique. 'But what is novel, and hitherto perfectly unnoticed in medical literature, is the fact that not only the girl, which has been carried its full term, is alive to-day, but the fœtus within the swelling has also, in the eleven days after birth, further developed, and palpably increased in size. The swelling is now four and a half inches long, three and a half inches wide, and high and pear-shaped; the head lies underneath on the left, the body towards the right.'
Further particulars and the latest intelligence we have concerning the progress of this case are to the effect that the child was brought by special request before the Natural History Society of Dantzic, and thence the mother went to Berlin for medical advice.
MORAL ASPECTS OF THIS QUESTION.
Upon proper judgment and discrimination in the application of the facts we have just been dwelling upon, may depend a wife's honor, and the happiness of the dearest social relations. We will suppose an example. A husband, immediately after the impregnation of his wife, is obliged to quit her, and remains absent a year. In the meanwhile she gives birth to two children, at an interval of a number of weeks. The question will then come up, Whether, under such circumstances, it is possible for her to do so consistently with conjugal purity.
It will be recollected that, in speaking of twins, we remarked that it was not very uncommon for an interval of days or weeks to elapse between the births, and it has just been stated that impregnation during pregnancy is extremely rare. The presumption, therefore, in the case supposed, is as very many to one that the two births were the result of a twin pregnancy. In the absence of any other evidence against the wife's chastity, it should not even be called in question. This decision receives the support of the maxim in law that a reasonable doubt is the property of the accused, and of the Christian principle that it is better that ninety-nine guilty should escape than that one innocent should be condemned. Hence the teachings of science and of human and divine law all coincide to protect the sacred rights and the precious interests at stake against an unjust suspicion, which even the doctrine of chances would render untenable.
CAN A CHILD CRY IN THE WOMB?
There are some cases, recorded on undoubted authority, in which the child has been heard to cry while in the womb. These are very exceptional. Under ordinary circumstances, it is impossible for the child either to breathe or cry, because of the absence of air. It is only when the bag of membranes has been torn, and the mouth of the child is applied at or near the neck of the uterus, that this can take place. The infant is not unfrequently heard to cry just before birth, after labor has commenced, but before the extrusion of the head from the womb, in consequence of the penetration of air into the uterine cavity.
IS IT A SON OR DAUGHTER?
It is a common saying among nurses, that there is a difference in the size and form of the pregnant woman, according to the sex she carries. This may well be doubted. Neither is it true that one sex is more active in its 'movements' than the other. It is quite possible, however, for a wife to know the sex of the fœtus, if she can tell about what time in her month conception took place. If it occurred directly after a monthly sickness, the child is a girl; if directly before, it is a boy. When a woman is 'out' in her reckoning, and goes beyond the period of her expected confinement, it will ordinarily turn out to be a boy. The skilful doctor can, in the later months of pregnancy, settle the question of sex in some cases. The beats of the fœtal heart are more frequent in females than in males. The average frequency of pulsations of twenty-eight female fœtuses has been found to be one hundred and forty-four in the minute, the lowest figure being one hundred and thirty-eight; of twenty-two male fœtuses, one hundred and twenty, the lowest figure being one hundred and twelve. Therefore, when the pulsations of the heart of the child in the womb are counted,—as can easily be done by a practised medical ear during the last months of pregnancy,—and are found to be over one hundred and thirty in a minute, it is a daughter; if under one hundred and thirty, a son. In this manner, the sex of an unborn child can be predicted with tolerable accuracy, excepting only when illness of the fœtus has deranged the action of its heart.