CELL -SPACES OF CONNECTIVE TISSUE. 81 



never to put the cover-glass in its place until a 

 glance at the ohject under a low power of the micro- 

 scope has certified the absence of any marked imper- 

 fection : if this be attended to, the time will often 

 be saved which would otherwise be spent in mount- 

 ing worthless specimens. 



These silver-preparations of the subcutaneous tissue 

 vary considerably in appearance according to the part of 

 the limb from which they are taken, and it is in man} 7 

 cases difficult full} 7 to comprehend the meaning of what 

 is seen, so that it will be better perhaps to omit for the 

 present this preparation, especially as the one following 

 furnishes a very ready and clear means of demonstrating 

 the cell spaces of connective tissue. 



Preparation 8. The connective tissue which 

 covers the tendons of the superficial flexor digitorum 

 of the ox's foot as they run through sheaths formed 

 by the tendons of the deep flexor is much more easily 

 prepared by the silver method than the looser kinds 

 like the subcutaneous just described. A piece of 

 such a tendon is taken, rinsed in distilled water to 

 remove the synovial fluid which covers it, and treated 

 with silver solution in the way just described; and 

 is then, after washing., placed in the light in strong 

 spirit. It soon becomes brown, when it may be re- 

 moved from the light; and after remaining twenty- 

 four hours in the spirit it is easy, with a sharp knife 

 or razor wetted with spirit, to obtain a thin surface 

 section. This, after being immersed for a minute 

 or two in water to get rid of the spirit, is mounted 

 in glycerine with the browned surface uppermost. 

 It should present, if successful, an extremely charac- 

 teristic and beautiful image of white branched cell- 

 spaces, single or in groups, upon a brown ground. 



In both the preparations last described it is possi- 

 ble to show the nuclei of the corpuscles which lie 

 in the cell-spaces by subsequent staining with log- 

 wood. Sometimes they are visible even without 

 this treatment. 



