MORPHOLOGY OF THE TUBULES OF THE HUMAN 

 TESTIS AND EPIDIDYMIS 



JOHN LEWIS BREMER 

 Harvard Medical School, Boston, Mass. 



TWELVE FIGURES 



The intention of this paper is to show accurately the form of the 

 seminiferous tubules of the testis and of the tubules of the epididy- 

 mis, and to trace their development in man, especially in the late 

 embryonic and fetal stages. With this study the blood vessels 

 are so intimately associated that a description of them is added. 



TESTIS 



Many attempts have been made heretofore to decide whether 

 the tubules are single with blind ends, or anastomosing, or merely 

 branching, but the methods used gave contradictory results, and 

 were unsatisfactory. Teasing methods are not convincing, be- 

 cause, in spite of the particularly tough reticular tissue described 

 by Hill as encircling them, the tubules are easily broken ; and in- 

 jections are never complete, as the injection mass is forced through 

 the walls of the tubules before the resistance of the many con- 

 volutions is overcome. The method employed as a basis of this 

 paper is the study of serial sections, from which usually wax recon- 

 structions have been made. The material is human, though fre- 

 quently the many embryos of pig, sheep, cat, rabbit, etc., in the 

 Harvard Embryological Collection have given valuable assistance 

 in interpreting the human material. 



Allen has given us an account of the origin of the seminiferous 

 tubules, of the rete testis, and of the connections of this latter 

 with the tubules of the Wolffian body on the one hand and the 



THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OP ANATOMY, VOL. 11, NO. 4 



393 



