ON THE LYMPHATIC SYSTEM. 157 



if any, are easily perceived; the conneotive-iissue corpuscles are 

 noticed by their oval nucleus. 



The important fact that I wish to point out as regards the 

 arrangement of the connective tissue surrounding the large ducts 

 and vessels, and also separating the lobules, is this, viz. that the 

 traheculiz or the grouj^s of bundles are aggregated into definite 

 plates, which vary in breadth and thickness. These plates may 

 be called the "fascicle plates" each of them being composed of 

 a number of fasciculi or bundles of connective-tissue fibrils. These 

 bundles within the same plate are arranged parallel, but after a 

 short course cross each other more or less, and having separated 

 from one another, some sooner and others later, bend off from 

 one plate to join another neighbouring one. In a section through 

 the interlobular connective tissue, this arrangement of the con- 

 nective-tissue fasciculi into plates is easily ascertained, and it is 

 well shown in fig. 1. In this figure at 1 these " fascicle 

 plates " are seen in section^ and the fibre bundles constituting 

 them are seen cut transversely, or obliquely, or more or less 

 longitudinally ; at 2 the bundles are seen passing from one 

 plate to another; at 3 are indicated the ordinary flattened 

 branched connective-tissue corpuscles. These fascicle plates 

 can be traced in all parts of the interlobular connective tissue, 

 and also in that immediately surrounding the intralobular chief 

 duct, provided this tissue is not too small in amount ; in the 

 parotid of the dog and ape, and in the submaxillary of man and 

 dog, they are easily made out. In the parotid and submaxillary 

 of the rabbit and guinea-pig, and in the sublingual gland of 

 these animals, the amount of the connective tissue around the 

 chief duct within a lobule is very small ; it is represented by a 

 few delicate bundles of fibrous tissue, running parallel with the 

 duct. But between the lobules the arrangement of the bundles 

 into the above fascicle plates is everywhere distinct, be the 

 amount large, as in the parotid of the dog and ape, and the 

 submaxillary of man and dog, or be it small, as in the parotid 

 and submaxillary of the rabbit and guinea-pig. The difference 

 between the fascicle plates in various glands and in various 

 places of the same gland, consists merely in their breadth and 

 thickness; the former, i. e. the breadth, depends on the number 

 of bundles placed side by side in one plate, while the latter, 

 i. e. the thickness, depends on the thickness of the individual 

 bundles and their number above one another. Passing, in the 

 same gland, from the large and thick septa between the groups 

 of lobules or the lobes on to the smaller and thinner septa 

 between the individual lobules, we notice a gradual decrease of 

 the fascicle plates, both in breadth and thickness. In the parotid 

 of the dog and the ape, in the submaxillary of man and dog, 



