STUDIES IN THE RETINA. 311 



made out. This, indeed, is wliat we sliall now do, and, as 

 we shall see, with a result common enough in science, that 

 observations long neglected and disci'edited, aud over which 

 some patient observer perhaps broke his heart, are at last 

 confirmed. 



The first clue as to the method of suspension of the retinal 

 nuclei was supplied by a discovery which I made several 

 years ago, but neglected because, at the time, it was too 

 fragmentary even to suggest its being more than some 

 accidental phenomenon. At intervals I noticed exquisitely 

 delicate thi'eads emanating from the intra-nuclear network, 

 one here and there, and running from nucleus to nucleus. 

 They were very difficult to focus, and, no matter how deeply 

 the section was stained, remained hyaline or subtended too 

 small an angle to show any colour. They were at first 

 rarely seen ; many slides showed no trace of th em, however 

 diligently they were searched. But after finding them in 

 several different eyes, sometimes singly, sometimes three or 

 four close together, I became convinced that they indicated 

 something of importance for the understanding of the retina. 

 Figs. 13 a aud h represent some of the first instances seen. 

 The connecting threads were just on the borders of our best 

 microscopical powers of vision, and so delicate that one could 

 rarely hope, I thought, to find them preserved intact over a 

 large field. 



Fortunately we are not confined to evidence so difficult to 

 obtain as this in order to establish the existence of these fila- 

 ments as apermanent addition to ourknowledge of protoplasmic 

 structure. There is an abundance of other evidence, much of 

 it, it is true, indirect, but nevertheless so instructive that I 

 have long given up straining my eyes to try to see the 

 filaments directly. As a somewhat interesting personal ex- 

 perience, however, I should like to add that since this paper 

 was nearly in its present shape I have once more run over 

 a score or two of sections of different retinas for the express 

 purpose of ascertaining whether, now that I have no more 

 doubt as to their existence throughout the whole retina, I 



