98 DAEMON A. RHINEHART 



detail elsewhere in this paper. Several of these small bodies 

 were carefully dissected out and carried through separately, but 

 with poor results. Those sections of the parathyroid in which 

 the nerves are the most abundant are attached to some of the 

 more satisfactorily stained sections of thyroid. The treatment 

 in both cases is, therefore, identical. 



The first and most striking thing observed on examination of 

 these sections of parathyroid is the scarcity of the nerves as com- 

 pared to the great numbers found in the thyroid. It would at 

 first seem that this might be due to incomplete staining, which 

 is not at all probable, for in the adjacent thyroid tissue partially 

 or completely surrounding the parathyroid, the nerves are 

 beautifully stained. The similar density of the two bodies leads 

 me to believe that a method giving a satisfactory result in one 

 would lead to a like result in the other. 



The arteries supplying the parathyroid bodies are branches of 

 the thyroid arteries, and may take either or both of two routes 

 in reaching their places of distribution. When the bodies are 

 not closely connected there is one relatively large branch that 

 passes directly into the parathyroid, but when the thyroid par- 

 tially or completely surrounds the parathyroid, more numerous 

 but smaller branches take origin from the thyroid vessels within 

 the thyroid gland and pass through the intervening small amount 

 of loose connective tissue into the parathyroid. Inasmuch as 

 the nerves follow these arteries, they arise from the large nerve 

 bundles around the thyroid vessels and accompany their branches 

 into the parathyroid. It is very probable, therefore, that the 

 nerves supplying both glands constitute a single set of sympa- 

 thetic fibers. 



Around the parathyroid arteries there are formed nerve plexuses 

 resembling the perivascular plexuses of the thyroid vessels, dif- 

 fering, however, in not being nearly so elaborate, and in consist- 

 ing of single fibers. The branching of the nerves accompanies 

 the branching of the arteries, so that the smaller arterial twigs 

 usually carry with them a single nerve fiber. There are no nerves 

 around the veins or capillaries. 



