TERMINATION OP NERVES IN THE LIVER. 455 



a longitudinal section of a capillary contains a view of this 

 plexus in all its relations^ on the one hand with the hepatic 

 cells, and on the other with the capillary wall. The latter 

 appears closely embraced by the network which also, in well- 

 preserved specimens, borders the hepatic cells. In this respect 

 one has great difficulty, as in the human liver, in deciding to 

 which the network belongs physiologically, if to the capillary 

 wall or to the cells ; the terminations of this network show that 

 it belongs to the latter. Is it to be supposed, however, that 

 nerves are not distributed to the capillaries themselves ? 



It was of course much easier to determine how the long 

 intercellular fibrils terminate than to do the same thing for 

 the fibrils of the perivascular plexus. My first conclusion, after 

 some observation, was that both terminate in a like manner, 

 but I soon perceived that it was rarely possible in thin sections 

 to decide whether a fibril which runs in the capillary channel 

 and gives off intracellular twigs belongs to the intercellular 

 class or to perivascular network. Both class of fibrils are 

 equally delicate. The intercellular ones I found again and 

 again to terminate within the hepatic cells. I had therefore 

 to guard against confusing the two sets of fibrils as to their ter- 

 minations. One of the several cases where an absolute decision 

 was possible is drawn in fig. 3. Here fibrils of the network 

 are seen to give off twigs which penetrate the adjoining hepatic 

 cells, while on the opposite edge of the capillary channel a fibril, 

 apparently belonging to the intercellular order, terminates in a 

 like way. 



The intercellular fibrils branch at certain intervals, each 

 branch running at sharp angles with the main trunk. I believe 

 several times to have detected a network of these branchlets. 

 In such a case these intercellular fibrils would correspond to 

 those of the intercellular network in the human liver. I must, 

 however, leave this point in abeyance. If this network is 

 usually present obstacles to its demonstration are certainly to 

 be found in the deep tinting which the cell reticulum acquires 

 from the gold method. The perivascular network, on the other 

 hand, is not obscured, for the capillary walls over against which 



VOL. XXVII, PART 4. NEW SER. K K 



