Induction of labour.

' The first account of any artificial method of bringing on premature labour was given to me by Dr. C. Kelly. He informed me that'about the year I756 there was a consultation of the most eminent men in London at that time, to consider of the moral rectitude of, and advantages which may be expected from, this practice, which met with their general approbation. The first case in which it was deemed necessary and proper fell under the care of the late Dr. Macaulay, and it terminated successfully. (The patient was the wife of a linen-draper in the Strand.) . . . The thing has often been the subject of conversation, and proposed by writers, but some have doubted the morality of the practice; and the circumstances which may render the operation needful and proper have not been stated with any degree of precision' (T. Denman, I8oi).