58 SECRETION. 



external meatus of the ear. Another fluid, very much like 

 the ordinary sebaceous matter, is smeared upon the edges of 

 the eyelids. These secretions, called respectively cerumen 

 and Meibomian fluid, resemble the secretion of the ordinary 

 sebaceous glands sufficiently to be classed with it. 



Physiological Anatomy of the Sebaceous, Ceruminous, 

 and Meibomian Glands. The true sebaceous glands are 

 found in all parts of the body that are provided with hair ; 

 and as nearly every part of the general surface presents 

 either the long, the short, or the downy hairs, these glands 

 are very generally distributed. They exist, indeed, in 

 greater or less numbers in all parts of the skin, except the 

 palms of the hands and the soles of the feet. In the labia 

 minora in the female, and in portions of the prepuce and 

 glans penis of the male, parts not provided with hair, small 

 racemose sebaceous glands are found, which produce secre- 

 tions differing somewhat from that formed by the ordinary 

 glands. The glands in the areola of the nipple in the female 

 are very large, and are connected with small, downy hairs. 

 Kolliker has observed these glands, not connected with hairs, 

 upon the nipple of the male. 1 



Nearly all of the sebaceous glands are either simple 

 racemose glands, that is, presenting a number of follicles 

 connected with a single excretory duct, or compound race- 

 mose glands, presenting several ducts, with their follicles, 

 opening by a common tube. Although there is this differ- 

 ence in the size and arrangement of the glands of the gen- 

 eral surface, they secrete essentially the same fluid, and their 

 anatomical differences consist simply in a multiplication of 

 follicles. 



The differences in the size of the sebaceous glands bear a 

 certain relation to the size of the hairs with which they are 

 connected ; and, as a rule, the largest glands are connected 

 with the small, downy hairs. These distinctions in size are 



1 KOLLIKER, Handbuch der Gewebelehre des Menschen, Leipzig, 1867, S. 571. 



