THE LYMPHATICS. 697 



posed merely of a plexus of lymphatic vessels. As regards the relation 

 of the lymphatics to the glandular part or alveoli, together with their 

 contents, I formerly felt compelled to express myself in opposition to 

 the notion propounded by Ludwig and Noll, although without having 

 entered deeply into the subject, principally because, whilst it seemed to 

 me improbable, that the alveoli of the glands in question should contain 

 bloodvessels, and at the same time communicate with the lymphatics ; 

 and, in the second place, because in cases where the vasa afferentia and 

 efferentia were full of milk-white chyle, I was never able to perceive 

 similarly colored contents in the alveoli. These facts, indeed, still retain 

 all their weight with me ; but they are now more than outweighed by 

 further experience, so that it appears very doubtful whether they justify 

 the conclusions which I formerly thought might be deduced from them. 

 For I find, like Ludwig, in a considerable number of injections in the 

 human subject, Dog (cervical glands), and Ox (lumbar glands), that it 

 is impossible to fill lymphatic vessels in the interior of the glands, and 

 that the injection either colors only the ramifications of the vasa infe- 

 rentia upon the gland, or when it runs further, as it may be more easily 

 made to do in animals than in Man, it enters the alveoli, which it fills 

 according to their position in the series, and escapes through the vasa 

 efferentia. Induced by the result of these experiments, I should now, 

 without being desirous of giving a definitive opinion, be inclined to side 

 with Ludwig, and to deny the existence of any direct connection between 

 the afferent and efferent lymphatics, or rather to view the alveoli of the 

 glands as a specially modified part of them.* In accordance with this 

 notion, the lymph would be poured out into the alveoli, and flow through 

 them in fine divided streams among the elements of which their con- 

 tents are composed ; and, to this circumstance, it is probably owing that 

 it never -has a milk-white color. In this process it is possible that some 

 of the cells of these contents, which so closely resemble the lymph- 

 corpuscles, may be detached and become disintegrated, whence the 

 chyle of the vasa efferentia abounds more in morphological elements, 

 than the fluid conveyed by the vasa efferentia. At the same time, I am 

 decidedly opposed to the view which would regard the morphological 

 contents of the alveoli as directly appertaining to the lymph, as lymph- 

 cells which are there formed, and subsequently conveyed away from 

 the gland. I consider them rather as an independent, stationary, 

 glandular element, standing, indeed, in the closest relation with the 

 chyle, but not necessarily forming a part of it, or passing into the 



* [In a paper since published, Prof. Kolliker states, that he is now entirely satisfied 

 of the correctness of the views of Ludwig and Noll. He considers, however, that 

 the lymphatics regain their coats in the medullary substance, where they form a minute 

 plexus, from which the vasa efferentia proceed (Vid. Kolliker, " Ueber den feineren Bau u. 

 die Functionen der Lymphdrusen," in " Verhand. d. Phys. Med. Ges.," in Wurzb. IV. 2, 1854.) 

 DaC.] 



