AN ANATOMICAL STUDY ON THE 



the urine, garlic placed on the feet promotes ex- 

 pectoration, cordials invigorate, and so on.^ It is 

 not unreasonable to say that the veins take up 

 through their openings some of the things applied 

 externally and carry them in with the blood, not 

 unlike the way in which those in the mesentery 

 absorb chyle from the intestines, and carry it along 

 with blood to the liver. 



Blood enters the mesentery through the coeliac, 

 and the superior and inferior mesenteric arteries, 

 and passes to the intestines. From these, along 

 with chyle drawn in by the veins, it is returned by 

 their many ramifications to the portal vein and 

 the liver, and from this to the vena cava.* The 

 blood in these veins is the same color and consis- 

 tency as in other veins, contrary to general opinion. 



It is not true that there are two opposite move- 

 ments in these capillaries, chyle inward and blood 

 outward. To be so must be considered incongru- 

 ous and improbable rather than constituted by the 

 great wisdom of Nature. If chyle were mixed with 

 blood, the raw with the concocted, in equal parts, 

 no coction, or blood formation would follow. Rather 

 there would be a mixture of the two as in the ming- 

 ling of wine in water or syrup. But when a very 

 small amount of chyle is added to a lot of blood, 



' The factors concerned in skin absorption have attracted much 

 attention since the development of chemical warfare. No studies 

 have been made, that I know of, on the materials mentioned here. 



* See Note 2, Chapter XIII. 



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