QUARTERLY CHRONICLE OF MICROSCOPICAL SCIENCE, 195 
non-medullated nerve-fibres, intensely coloured by chloride 
of gold. In addition to this network, stellate bodies coloured 
dark violet by chloride of gold he among the pavement-epi- 
thelium, the bodies being similar to those described by 
Langerhans from the human epidermis. Sertoli is inclined 
to regard them as non-nervous. As this intra-epithelial 
nervous network lies deeply imbedded and protected in the 
furrows of the papilla foliata, it cannot, according to Sertoli, 
be regarded as an anatomical substratum of tactile sensibility, 
and he also claims it as a gustatory organ, as the form of 
termination of the specific sensory nerves of the tongue. In 
fact, this same intra-epithelial nerve-ending, which often 
penetrates to the most superficial layers of the epithelium, 
occurs quite commonly in the papille fungiformes of the 
horse’s tongue. These papille are distributed in great 
numbers and with great regularity over the whole dorsum 
of the tongue, and it is very tempting to regard this form of 
ending as the anatomical condition of the gustatory sense 
distributed over the whole surface of the tongue. 
The conclusion of the paper is occupied with the consider- 
ation of the minute anatomy of the gustatory dises (which are 
tinged of a very characteristic dark colour by chloride of 
gold. (London Medical Record.) 
IX. Vascular System.—l. Contractile Coat of Blood-vessels, 
—Rouget (‘ Comptes Rendus,’ Aug. 31st, 1874) describes 
cells with ramified processes from the outer coat of vessels. 
They are truly contractile, and arise, he thinks, from migra- 
tory ameeboid cells. 
2. Lymphatics of the Lwer.—Von Wittich (¢ Centralblatt 
fiir die Medicinischen Wissenschaften,’ No. 58, 1874), like 
Sikorski, has been able in the living rabbit to inject from the 
trachea an exceedingly irregular but narrow-meshed network 
lying partly in the pleura, partly in the subpleural tissue, 
and partly in the interstitial pulmonary tissue, and accom- 
panying the blood-vessels ; the author regards this network 
as consisting of lymphatics. In the freshly killed animal he 
succeeded in injecting, not only this network, but also the 
intercostal spaces and even the external thoracic muscles 
when artificial respiration was performed. 
If a rabbit be killed by bleeding, and, whilst artificial 
movement of the thorax is kept up, there be injected into the 
trachea, under moderate pressure, a concentrated solution of 
sulphindigotate of soda, one is struck with the quantity of 
fluid employed, and with the fact that the whole animal 
becomes of an intensely blue colour. The skin, the cover- 
ings of the eye, the tendons, the muscles, and the abdominal 
