66 OBSERVATIONS on 



The fecond is, That the human fkin con- 

 fifts of three parts : the cutis, or true fkin, 

 thick, porous, and vafcular ; the cuticle, or 

 fcarf fkin, thin, compa6t, and denfe; and 

 the rete mucofum, a fine expanded mucous 

 membrane betv^een them, more vafcular in 

 the face than it is in any other part of the 

 body, and the feat of colour in men of all 

 complexions *. 



In an epileptic paroxyfm, refpiration, which 

 depends upon mufcular adlion, is by fpafms 

 violently interrupted. Unlefs the lungs are 

 expanded, the blood cannot circulate through 

 the minute ramifications of the pulmonary 

 artery, from the right fide of the heart to 

 the left. The vena cava, charged with all the 

 returning blood from the head, will be unable 

 to empty itfelf into the right auricle of the 

 heart, already full : hence, an accumulation 



* In the blacked negroe which the coaft of Africa 

 ever produced, the cutis is as white as the faireftEura- 

 pean, the colour refides entirely in the rete mucofum. 

 I viewed the human cuticle lately by a folar microfcope, 

 which magnified objecSls more than three million times, 

 and no perforations were to be feen ; fo inconceivably 

 minute are thofe pores which give pa(I*ige to our in- 

 fenfible perfpiration* 



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