408 PYLORIC GLANDS. [BOOK n. 



cells, outside which are placed ovoid cells less numerous than in 

 the neck. Such glands placed side by side form the thickness of 

 the mucous membrane, and below them at a short distance runs in 

 a tolerably even line the thin muscularis mucosse with its single 

 inner circular and outer longitudinal layers of plain muscular 

 fibres. 



213. The space between the level of the bottom of the 

 glands and the muscularis mucosse as well as the vertical spaces 

 between the glands, that is all the space between the much 

 folded basement membrane above and the muscularis mucosas 

 below is occupied by delicate connective tissue the meshwork of 

 which, formed of thin narrow sheets or laminae rather than of 

 fibres or bundles, becomes especially close set immediately under 

 the basement membrane. In the spaces of the meshwork a 

 certain number of lymph corpuscles or leucocytes may be seen. 

 Small arteries passing upwards from the submucosa through 

 the muscularis mucosse break up into capillaries encircling the 

 glands in the form of plexuses which are especially close set at the 

 summits of the spaces between the glands, that is to say at the 

 places where the connective tissue lies nearest to the interior of 

 the stomach. Small veins springing from these capillaries, espe- 

 cially from those last named, running downwards pierce the 

 muscularis mucosse and form the larger veins in the submucous 

 coat. Lymphatic vessels and structures called lymphatic ' glands ' 

 are present in the mucous coat, but of these we shall speak later on. 



214. Pyloric glands. At the pyloric end of the stomach 

 the glands are much less closely packed than at the cardiac end, 

 and a vertical section of this region presents a general appearance 

 very different from that of the cardiac end. A typical pyloric 

 gland possesses a mouth which is much longer and generally 

 broader with a wider lumen than the mouth of a cardiac gland, 

 though the walls are lined with mucous cells like those of the 

 cardiac end. The body of the gland is either more branched than 

 is that of a cardiac gland, or the branching is at least, from the 

 looseness of the packing more obvious; the lumen too is wider. 

 The important feature however of the pyloric gland is that the 

 whole body with all its branches from the mouth to the several 

 blind ends is lined throughout with one kind of cell only, which is 

 very similar to the central cell of a cardiac gland, inasmuch as it is 

 a polyhedral or short columnar cell with a cell-body which in a 

 specimen prepared in the ordinary way is faintly granular ; as we 

 shall see, however, there are differences. The ' ovoid ' cell so 

 characteristic of the cardiac gland is absent. The arrangement of 

 the connective tissue with its blood vessels and lymphatics and of 

 the muscularis mucosae is much the same as at the cardiac end. 



Thus the cardiac end of the stomach contains glands which are 

 closely packed, which have a very narrow lumen, and which possess 

 two kinds of cells, central and ovoid, while the pyloric end contains 



