THE SUPRARENAL GLANDS. 015 



I have been inclined to regard as enlarged cells. The contents of the 

 cortical cells normally consist of fine granules of a nitrogenous sub- 

 stance; but to these are almost always added solitary fat-granules, which 

 in many cases (in the yellow cortical substance), exist in such quantity, 

 as entirely to fill the cells, Avhich then assume a deceptive resemblance 

 to those of a fatty liver. In the brown layer of the cortex, the cells are 

 entirely filled with brown pigment granules. 



The medullary substance also has a stroma of connective tissue, which, 

 prolonged from the cortical lamellcX^, pervades the whole interior, for the 

 most part, in more delicate fasciculi, constituting a network with rather 

 narrow, rounded meshes. In this network lies a pale, fine-granular sub- 

 stance, in which, in Man, by careful manipulation, and in recent prepa- 

 rations, I have almost always noticed pale cells of 0-008-0-016 of a line, 

 which, in their fine-granular contents, occasionally presenting a few fat, 

 or pigment granules, their frequently very distinct nucleus with large 

 nucleoli, their angular form, and occasionally single or multiple, or even 

 branched processes, resemble the nerve-cells of the central organs, 

 although they cannot definitively be declared to be such. 



§ 194. Vessels and nerves. — The bloodvessels of the suprarenal 

 glands are numerous, lie in the stroma of connective tissue, and form 

 two kinds of capillary plexuses ; one in the cortex with elongated 

 meshes, and one in the medullary substance with more rounded inter- 

 stices. The arteries arise as numerous (amounting to twenty) small ves- 

 sels from the neighboring larger trunks (phrenic, celiac, aortic, renal), 

 and either penetrate directly into the medullary substance or ramify in 

 the cortical. The latter, which are the more numerous, cover the outer 

 surface of the organ with their multiplied ramifications, and form a 

 wide capillary plexus even in the outer tunic. They then subdivide into 

 numerous fine twigs, and dip down into the dissepiment of the cortex, 

 in which, becoming more and more attenuated, they run straight to- 

 wards the medulla, being mutually connected in their course by pretty 

 numerous transverse anastomoses, so that the cortical cylinders are sur- 

 rounded by blood on all sides. The extremities of these vessels extend 

 to the interior of the medulla, where, in common with the arteries 

 which penetrate directly to the same point (of which, however, accord- 

 ing to Nagel, in the Sheep, some proceed from the medulla entirely to 

 the cortex) they form a rich capillary plexus of rather large vessels. 

 The veins arise chiefly from this latter plexus, and, within the medul- 

 lary substance, join the principal vein of the organ, — the v. suprarenalis 

 — which comes out on the anterior surface, at the so-termed hilus, 

 emptying itself, on the right side, into the vena cava and on the left, 

 into the renal vein. Besides these, a good many smaller veins arise 

 from the cortex, which either accompany the arteries in pairs, or pro- 



