68 



GENERAL ANATOMY. 



terminate either in a coiled plexiform mass or in a bulbous extremity. They 

 have been described as occurring in the conjunctiva, the mucous membrane of 

 the mouth, and the surface of the glans penis and glans clitoridis. 1 



The tactile corpuscles of Wagner (Fig. 38) are described by him as oval- 

 shaped bodies, made up of superimposed saccular laminae, presenting some 

 resemblance to a miniature fir-cone, and he regarded them as directly concerned 

 in the sense of touch. Kolliker considers that the central part of the papillee 

 generally consists of a connective tissue more homogeneous than that of the 

 outer part, surrounded by a sort of sheath of elastic fibres, and he believes that 

 these corpuscles are merely a variety of this structure. The nerve-fibres, 



Fig. 33. 



A. Side view of a papilla of the hand. a. Cortical 

 layer ; b, tactile corpuscle, with transverse nuclei ; e, 

 small nerve of the papilla, with neurilemma; d, its two 

 nervous fibres running with spiral coils around the tactile 

 corpuscle ; e, apparent termination of one of these fibres. 

 B. A tactile papilla seen from above, so as to show its 

 transverse section, a. Cortical layer; b, nerve fibre ; 

 c, outer layer of the tactile body, with nuclei ; d, clear 

 interior substance. From the human subject, treated 

 with acetic acid. (Magnified 350 times.) 



Pacinian corpuscle with its system of capsules 

 and central cavity, a. Arterial twig, ending in 

 capillaries, which form loops in some of the 

 intercapsular spaces, and one penetrates to the 

 central capsule ; b, the fibrous tissue of the stalk 

 prolonged from the neurilemma; n, nerve-tube 

 advancing to the central capsule, there losing 

 its white substance, and stretching along the 

 axis to the opposite end 1 , where it is fixed by a 

 tubercular enlargement. 



according to this observer, ru'n up in a waving course to the corpuscle, not 

 penetrating it, but forming two or three coils round it, and finally join together 

 in loops. These bodies are not found in all the papillae ; but from their exist- 

 ence in those parts in which the skin is highly sensitive, it is probable that 

 they are especially concerned in the sense of touch, though their absence from 

 the papillae of other tactile parts shows that they are not essential to this sense. 

 The Pacinian corpuscles 2 (Fig. 3-4) are found in the human subject chiefly on 

 the nerves of the fingers and toes, lying in the subcutaneous cellular tissue; but 



1 Krause, Die terminalen Korperclien, 1860. Anatomische Untersuchungen, 1861. 



2 Often called in German anatomical works " corpuscles of Vater." 



