2^ DR. BEALE, OX THE TISSUES. 



the portion of formed material (intercellular substance) is 

 very greats this is not the case in the young tissue. At an 

 early period of development of all these textures, germinal 

 matter is present in considerable proportion. 



Those who consider the so-called nucleus as the least 

 important and least constant part of the tissue will perhaps 

 answer the above remarks by the assertion that nuclei are not 

 to be detected in all tissues, and by calling attention to obser- 

 vations in which these nuclei are stated to be vacuoles in a 

 homogeneous structure. It has been already stated that they 

 are much more numerous in many tissues than is generally 

 supposed, and are to be demonstrated only by the action of 

 carmine and certain other colouring matters. With regard 

 to the so-called vacuoles in young tissues generally, Dr. 

 Beale remarked that the clear material occupying these 

 spaces is the substance which he has termed germinal matter, 

 which becomes coloured red by carmine. 



In young vegetable tissues the term vacuole is applied to 

 spaces containing a transparent material which occupies the 

 same position as that in which the primordial utricle is after- 

 wards found. This transparent material and the primordial 

 utricle are both coloured by carmine, and both consist of 

 germinal matter. The manner in which secondary deposits 

 occur in the substance of this germinal matter has been re- 

 ferred to in page 263, Vol. II. 



As it has been shown that the material (germinal matter) 

 coloured red by carmine in cartilage and tendon exactly cor- 

 responds to that in epithelium, and that neither cartilage, 

 epithelium, or any other structure exists in a growing state 

 Avithout it, the inference that it is essential to these tissues 

 seems justifiable. If cartilage could be formed without ger- 

 minal matter the cell-wall could be produced independently 

 of it. There is no more reason for believing that cartilage or 

 fibrous tissue can be produced from a nutrient fluid without 

 the agency of active living matter than that this living matter 

 can be precipitated from a fluid composed of a solution of 

 inanimate matter. 



The contents of cells are easily removed from the investing 

 membrane, or from the walls of the ca^aty in which they are 

 contained, because the structure which lies between the ger- 

 minal matter and the perfectly-developed formed material, 

 although continuous in the natural state of the parts with 

 both, is exceedingly soft. It is no longer composed of par- 

 ticles like the germinal matter which are held together as a 

 viscid coherent mass, nor is it yet sufficiently firm to ])Ossess 

 the powers of resistance resident in the fully-developed formed 



