May harrow the heart of an affectionate master
The shriek of the bitch during the time when a pup probably is being forced into the world, may harrow the heart of an affectionate master, and his sympathies may be wrought upon by beholding the convulsion which stretches every fibre of her frame. The sounds may grate upon the ear, and the spectacle may be terrible to look upon for in dogs I have seen misery so powerfully exemplified, that I do no wrong to any man, when I suppose the picture would be piteous to his humanity but it is not charity which would put a termination to the pangs. Place the bitch, then, in a warm bath, and the appearances almost instantaneously are changed. The animal rejoices in the ease which a cessation of torture produces. No doubt she, for the time, luxuriates, and her face expresses the sense of happiness she then enjoys. But her fate is with the pleasure sealed; and she obtains a momentary ease to meet with a lingering, or perhaps a frightful death, for I have known inflammation of the womb to follow the use of the warm bath. The use of the warm bath is, during labor, at best a mistake generated by ignorance; and unfortunately it is one of those errors which can rarely be afterwards redeemed; for the weakness it induces is so great, that the tonicity required in parturition is destroyed; and this no medicine can restore.
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