LITERARY NOTICES. 



Van Gphnchten's Aoatomie dii Systeme Nerveux.' 



Professor Van Gehuchten's Text-book has passed through three 

 editions at intervals of three years, the present edition being nearly 

 twice as large as the first. The arrangement is, however, the same, 

 comprising an exhaustive treatment of both the central and the periph- 

 eral nervous systems. The work falls into two great divisions, The 

 Cerebro-spinal Nervous System, and the Sympathetic Nervous System, 

 the latter comprising 24 pages out of a total of 1052. The lectures 

 on the cerebro-spinal system are grouped under three general heads, 

 (i) The Gross Anatomy of the Axis Cerebro-spinalis, (2) The Internal 

 Structure of the Axis Cerebro-spinalis, (3) The General Structure of 

 the Cerebro-spinal System, the latter being a r6sum6 in seven chapters 

 designed to give "the quintessence of all that students of medicine 

 and physicians ought to know of the structure of the nerve centers." 

 Under the second head there are six lectures devoted to General Con- 

 siderations upon the Nervous Elements, followed by the discussion of 

 the several regions of the central system, the peripheral nerves being 

 presented in connection with their centers. 



Professor Van Gehuchten has himself had a large part in the shap- 

 ing of neurological opinion during the past decade and we naturally 

 turn with interest to his General Considerations, as expressing his latest 

 opinions upon a number of debatable questions. In this work he reaf- 

 firms his earlier views of the independence of the neurones and treats 

 all undoubted cases of anastomosis as wholly exceptional, freaks or 

 monstrosities In the reviewer's opinion this extreme position is hardly 

 supported by the focts now at command. Unquestionable cases of 

 anastomosis are too numerous and too important to be dismissed in this 

 way, though this of course does not imply any theory as to what their 

 significance really is. The author states the opposing views of Apathy, 

 Held, Bethe and Nissl very fully, but it would appear as if he gave 

 them hardly sufficient weight. He does well, however, to insist that 

 the most important of the conclusions of these articles are highly the- 



' Anatomic du Systdme Nerveux de I'homme : Lemons professdes a I'Uni- 

 versite de Louvain. 3d. edition, 3 vols. Louvain, 1900. 



