OF THE SKIN. 129 



skin. Ft. Wagner believes that be has, in fact, found tbese 

 organs in bis so-called corpuscula tacttis, and be supposes that, 

 composed as tbey are, according to him, of superimposed 

 membranes, in the interspaces of which a very minute quantity 

 of fluid is lodged, like elastic cushions, or a bladder filled with 

 water, they are specially fitted to receive impressions from the 

 epidermis at the extremity which is directed towards it, and to 

 transmit them to the ends of the nerves which lie in and upon 

 them. 



In my opinion, Weber's view of the greater sensibility of 

 the terminations of the nerves in the skin, can hardly be 

 doubted ; but, on the other hand, there is no obvious rea- 

 son, a priori, why peculiar hitherto unknown organs should 

 exist to that end ; nor why the condition to which I have 

 already referred, the more isolated course of the fibres of 

 the nervous tubules in the papilla) and terminal plexuses, 

 their fineness, superficial position, and the delicacy or ab- 

 sence of the neurilemma, may not abundantly suffice as an 

 explanation. That Wagner's so-called corpuscula tactus, my 

 axile corpuscles, are not tactile organs in the sense intended by 

 Weber, is easily demonstrable. Independently of the erro- 

 neousness of his views of their structure, and of the fact 

 that the nerves are not distributed in them, but only proceed 

 along them, outside, in order, in many cases, to terminate even 

 beyond them — we find that all the essential functions of the 

 skin are also performed without such corpuscles. The feeling of 

 warmth and cold, of orgasm, of tickling, of pressure, of prick- 

 ing, of burning, of pain, are found partly over the whole 

 surface of skin, partly in places where these corpuscles are 

 certainly absent, which sufficiently shows that they have not in 

 the remotest degree the signification ascribed to them by Wagner. 

 However, it is not likely that they exist for nothing in those 

 particular localities, in which the sensibility to pressure is the 

 greatest, and which we use especially as tactile organs, as the 

 ends of the fingers, the point of the tongue, and the border of 

 the lips ; and I consider them as parts, which, in consequence of 

 their being composed principally of dense, imperfectly -formed 

 elastic tissue, confer a certain solidity upon the points of the 

 papillae, and serve as a firm support for the nerves, in consequence 

 of which, a pressure, which in other situations is not sufficient to 



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