BRANCHES OF GANGLION CERVICALE SUPERIUS 377 
TABLE 5 
Pharyngeal branches 
ste Unopened NUMBER OF yanarees DIAMETERS OF MYELINATED FIBERS 
METERS MILLIMETERS 1.5to3.34 3.3 to4.5u 
per cent per cent 
IV 0.0044 80 18230.25 100 
V 0.002 25 12446.0 96 4 
VIII 0.0031 4 1274.0 100 
bifurcation of the carotid artery (20), where the external carotid 
plexus has its origin. . 
These branches contain about the same proportion of myelin- 
ated fibers as the other branches of the superior cervical ganglion 
already studied. These varied from four to eighty in actual 
number and from 1,274 to 18,230 per square millimeter. Practi- 
cally all of the fibers had a diameter which did not exceed 3.3u. 
and in one case 80 per cent of them measured less than 2u. 
BRANCH TO SUPERIOR THYROID ARTERY 
A constant branch is to be found coming off from the lower 
one-third of the ganglion on the medial side (10 and 22). It is 
continued downward along the sympathetic trunk and common 
carotid artery to the level of the superior thyroid artery, spring- 
ing from the common carotid. Here it may give off a lateral 
branch (8) which courses along a small unnamed arterial twig 
to the second and third cervical nerve. This is the arrangement 
noted by Langley (’93) and considered under the description of 
the branches to the cervical nerves. 
The main part of the nerve can be traced along the superior 
thyroid artery to the upper pole of the thyroid gland. It was 
thought that in a few instances a twig (21) could be followed 
upward along the common carotid artery after curving around the 
superior thyroid. If this is true, it would suggest that this is 
the perithyroid ansa described by Garnier and Villemin (’10, p. 
405). They do not describe their ansa in the cat, but it is pres- 
ent in the rabbit and the dog. It is said to give off branches 
along the superior thyroid artery and the superficial or ascending 
