ORGANS OF DIGESTION, 



A young lean cat which has had no food for twenty- 

 four hours is the best subject for the demonstration of 

 the digestive system. Directions for preparing the 

 specimen are given in the chapter on technique. 



The digestive system (Figs. 54 and 55) consists of 

 the alimentary canal and the accessory glands of diges- 

 tion. The canal is made up of the mouth, pharynx, 

 esophagus, stomach, small intestine, and large intestine. 

 Its entire length is about five times that of the cat from 

 the tip of the nose to the root of the tail. The accessory 

 glands consist of five pairs of salivary glands, the liver, 

 and the pancreas. 



THE MOUTH. 



The mouth is bounded cephalad by the lips, laterally 

 by the cheeks, and dorsally by the palate, where the 

 mucous membrane lies in seven or eight transverse 

 ridges or rugae, and caudally depends from the palatine 

 bones forming the velum palati. To display the anatomy 

 of the mouth, one should remove the right half of the 

 mandible. From either side of the velum palati two 

 folds of membrane diverge as they extend to the floor 

 of the mouth at the root of the tongue. The cephalic 

 fold is the anterior pillar and the caudal one is the poste- 

 rior pillar of the fauces (Fig. 55). The caudal portion 

 of the mouth between these folds is known as the fauces. 

 It opens into the pharynx. On either side of the tongue 



between the two pillars is a crescentic depression holding 



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