Indian Medicine (Medicin), translated by C. G. Kashikar c11.5.3

c11.5.3

AS 2.1.200; AHr 2.1.37-42). Herein are included, according to the Gṛhya sūtras² the usages which aim at the prevention of a possible abortion (garbhasthāpana) particularly if after the signs of pregnancy menses occur from the fourth month onwards or there is acute pain in the bladder, lateral parts, hips and entrance of the vagina. The woman should be made to lie down on a soft and cool bed with the head a little sunk down; a wet clothpiece with certain substances applied to it should be inserted in her vagina and urinal canal; her lower body between the navel and the genitals should be smeared with certain fluids and she should be made to have a cold tub bath. She should also pull on clothes which are made wet with juice of milky trees; she should carry "important herbs" on head and in the right hand, should take milk or butter prepared with it, and use internally and externally "animating herbs" in general (Car 4.8.33 f.; AS 2.1.200; AHr 2.1.41 f.). Danger threatens the foetus, if the desires of the pregnant woman are not attended to. Analogous to the development of organs (indriya) in the third or fourth month, the life-sensation occurs in the foetus, it begins to palpitate and to carry longings for all that (according to the belief in the theory of the rebirth of the soul) it experienced in the previous life.