PHYSIOLOGICAL ANATOMY OF THE LIVEK. 



243 



FIG. 10. 



blood-vessels, and it seems to enclose in its meshes each indi- 

 vidual cell, extending from the periphery of the lobule, 

 where it is in communication with the interlobular bile- 

 ducts, to the intralobu- 

 lar vein in the centre. 

 The vessels probably 

 have excessively thin, 

 homogeneous walls 

 though the existence of 

 their membrane has not 

 been positively demon- 

 strated and are with- 

 out any epithelial lin- 

 ing, being much small- 

 er, indeed, than any 

 epithelial cells with 

 which we are acquaint- 

 ed. This arrangement, 



/. . -, , Portion of a transverse section of an hepatic lo- 



aS lar as IS KnOWll, naS bule of the rabbit, magnified 400 diameters, ft, 



capillary blood-vessels; ^, capillary bile-ducts; 

 /. liver-cells. (KQLLIKER, Handbuch der Gfeuxte- 

 lehre des Mewchen, Leipzig, 1867, S. 428.) 



no analogue in any 

 other secreting organ. 



Although it is within three or four years only that the 

 reticulated bile-ducts of the lobules have attracted much 

 attention, they were discovered in the substance of the 

 lobules, near the periphery, by Gerlach, in 1848. 1 It is evi- 

 dent, from an examination of his figures and description, 

 that he succeeded in filling with injection that portion of 

 the lobular network near the borders of the lobules, and 

 demonstrated the continuity of their vessels with the inter- 

 lobular ducts ; but he did not recognize the vessels nearer 

 the centre of the lobule. His views, however, received very 

 little attention, and are not even mentioned in most of the 

 authoritative works on general anatomy. Within the last 



1 GERLACH, Handbuch der allgemeinen und speddlen Gewebekhre, Mainz, 1848, 

 S. 280, et seq. 



