118 PHYSIOLOGY AT THE FARM. 



cature between the gall-bladder and liver, by which the organ 

 is suspended from the liver. The veins of the gall-bladder 

 join the portal system of veins. The duct of the gall-bladder 

 is named the cystic duct. It conveys the bile into the gall- 

 bladder from the hepatic duct, and when the bile is required it 

 returns by the same duct to the point at which it had before 

 left the hepatic duct. The hepatic duct is formed by the suc- 

 cessive union of all the minute biliary ducts derived from the 

 lobules into larger and larger branches, passing outwards 

 through the portal canals. The hepatic duct, when joined with 

 the cystic duct, becomes the great common bile-duct, known 

 in human anatomy as the ductus commimis choledochus. This 

 duct does not join the pancreatic duct, as in man, but ends 

 separately in the duodenum. 



Pancreas or Sweetbread. The pancreas or sweetbread has 

 a band-like form. It extends across the spine between the 

 duodenum and the spleen. In the ox it is more complex 

 than in most mammals. It has a duodenal portion besides 

 the principal part of the gland. It appears, from some recent 

 investigations, that several small supplementary glands com- 

 municate with the biliary ducts, notwithstanding that the pro- 

 per pancreatic duct terminates separately from the common 

 bile-duct in the duodenum. 



The pancreas is what has been called a conglomerate gland. 

 It resembles the salivary glands in a great many particulars. 

 Its intimate structure is very much the same as that of the 

 parotid gland. Its texture is, however, more loose, and softer. 

 It is composed of many lobes and lobules, very different in 

 size, united into one by blood-vessels and ducts, together with 

 areolar tissue. The areolar tissue penetrates everywhere be- 

 tween the lobes and lobules, so as to unite them into groups 

 and into a whole. The pancreas and its supplementary parts 

 are abundantly furnished with blood its blood-vessels, nerves, 



