A MANUAL OF DENTAL ANATOMY. 



globular " is thus strictly applicable, the use of the word 

 " spaces " is not so correct. In dry dentine it is true that 

 they are, as Czermak described them, spaces filled with air ; 

 but that they are so is only due to the fact that their 

 contents are soft, and shrivel up in drying. In the fresh 

 condition the interglobular " space " is perfectly full, its 

 contents often having the structural arrangement of the 

 rest of the matrix, or else consisting of soft plasm; in 

 the former case, the dentinal tubes pass across and through 

 it without any interruption or alteration in their course. 

 This fact, as well as the soft nature of the contents as com- 

 pared with the rest of the dentine, is well illustrated by a 

 section in my possession which was taken from a carious 



FIG. 35 C 1 . 



tooth, near to the affected surface. In this the fungus, 

 leptothrix, had effected an entrance into some of the tubes, 

 giving to them a varicose beaded appearance, and causing 

 their enlargement. But when it reached the interglobular 

 space, the less amount of resistance, or possibly the more 

 favourable pabulum accessible, led to its more rapid deve- 

 lopment, so that the tubes within the confines of the space 

 are many times more enlarged than those outside ; never- 

 theless the continuity of the tubes across the space is well 



( J ) Section of carious dentine, in which some of the tubes are beaded 

 by the ingress of the leptothrix, which has developed with greater freedom 

 in one or two of the tubes where they cross the interglobular spaces. 



