DUCTLESS GLANDS. 339 



Vessels and Nerves of the Spleen. The quantity of 

 blood which the spleen receives is very large in proportion 

 to the size of the organ. The splenic artery is the largest 

 branch of the coeliac axis. It is a vessel of considerable 

 length, and is remarkable for its excessively tortuous course. 

 In a man of between forty and fifty years of age, the vessel 

 measured about five inches, without taking account of its 

 deflections ; and a thread placed on the vessel, so as to follow 

 exactly all its windings, measured a little more than eight 

 inches. 1 The large calibre of this vessel and its tortuous 

 course are interesting points in connection with the great 

 variations in size and situation which the spleen is liable to 

 undergo in health and disease. The artery gives off several 

 branches to the adjacent viscera in its course, and as it 

 passes to the hilum divides into three or four branches, which 

 again divide so as to form from six to ten vessels. These 

 penetrate the substance of the spleen, with the veins, nerves, 

 and lymphatics, enveloped in the fibrous sheath, the capsule 

 of Malpighi. In the substance of the spleen the arteries 

 branch rather peculiarly, giving off many small ramifica- 

 tions in their course, generally at right angles to the parent 

 trunk. These are accompanied by the veins until they are 

 reduced to from -^j- to -fa of an inch in diameter. The two 

 classes of vessels then separate, and the arteries have at- 

 tached to them the corpuscles of Malpighi. It is also a 

 noticeable fact that the distinct trunks passing in at the 

 hilum have but few inosculations with each other in the 

 substance of the spleen, so that the organ is divided up into 

 from six to ten vascular compartments. This arrangement 

 was observed many years ago by Assollant. 3 



The veins join the fine branches of the arteries in the 

 spleen-pulp and pass out of the spleen in the same sheath. 

 They anastomose quite freely in their larger as well as their 



1 SAPPEY, Tratie cTanatomie, Paris, 1857, tome iii., p. 327. 



2 ASSOLLAXT, Recherche* sur la rate. These, No. 112, Paris, an xii. (1804), 

 p. 36. 



