MUSCULAR FIBRES OF HAIR-FOLLICLES. 



The soft, bulbous enlargement of the root of the hair is attached 

 by its base to the bottom of the fohicle, and at the circumference of 

 this attached part it is continuous with the epidermic lining. At 

 the bottom of the follicle it, in fact, takes the place of the epidermis, 

 of which it is a growth or extension, and this part of the follicle is the 

 true matrix of the hair, being, in reality, a part of the coriinn 

 (though sunk below the general surface), which supplies material lor 



Fis. 150. 



ir,i. 



Fig. 150. — Section of the Skin of the Head, -utth two Hair Follicles, slightly 

 Magnified (Kolliker). 



a, epidermis ; h, coriiim ; c, muscles of the hair-follicles. 



Fig. 151. — Hair Rudiment from an Embryo of Six Weeks, magnified 350 Diameters 



(Kolliker). 



a, horny, and h, mucous or Malpighian layer of cuticle ; /, limitary membrane ; m, cells, 

 some of which are assuming an oblong figure, which chiefly form the future hair. 



the production of the hair. From the bottom of this follicle rises a 

 small vascular i3apilla, usually of a- conical form, which fits into a 

 corresponding excavation of the hair-knoi) ; in the large tactile hairs 

 on the snout of the seal and some other animals it is very conspicuous. 

 As the follicle, in short, is a recess of the corium, so the hair-papilla 

 is a cutaneous papilla rising up in the bottom of it. The papilla is 

 sometimes of an ovoid shape, and attached to the bottom of the follicle 

 by a narrow base, or a sort of pedicle (fig. 147, i). Nervous branches 

 enter the hair-follicles, but their final distribution is obscure. In the 

 tactile hairs of animals, they are described as passing upwards over 

 the outer root-sheath, losing their white substance and forming a close 

 plexus with vertical meshes and numerous nuclei ; finally terminating 

 in an annular expansion, which encircles the hair just below the orifices 

 of the sebaceous glands, and is in immediate connection with the hyaline 

 layer of the follicle. In the larger tactile hairs the bulb is surrounded 

 by cavernous tissue, which lies between the outer and middle layers of 

 the dermic coat.* 



Slender bundles of plain muscular tissue are connected with the hair- 

 follicles (fig. 150). They arise from the most superficial part of the 

 corium, and pass down obliquely to be inserted into the outside of the 

 follicle below the sebaceous glands. They are placed on the side to 

 which the hair slopes, so that their action in elevating the hair is 

 evident. Some anatomists have also described a layer of circularly dis- 

 posed muscular cells as applied immediately to the outside of the follicle. 



* See papers by Leydig, Stieda, Schobl, and others. 



