16 ORGANS OF DIGESTION. 



sudden and extensive dilatations to which the stomach and bow- 

 els are exposed, from the introduction of food and from the evo- 

 lution of gases during digestion. Of all the coats of these organs, 

 it is the least extensible and contractile; its rupture, therefore, is 

 guarded against by one invariable rule. For example: as the 

 muscular and other coats of the stomach dilate, the peritoneum 

 is drawn from the omentum minus and majus to cover the sto- 

 mach; therefore, as the stomacji enlarges, the omenta diminish: 

 and as the stomach decreases, the omenta, by the restoration 

 of peritoneum, resume their primitive size. In this way the 

 uterus, notwithstanding its great augmentation in the progress 

 of pregnancy, still keeps itself covered by peritoneum, from the 

 ability of the latter, as mentioned, to slide from one part and to 

 apply itself to another. The true intention, then, of the appa- 

 rently useless length of many processes of the peritoneum, is 

 explained, by their being a provision for the augmentation of 

 the hollow viscera of the abdomen, in the discharge of their na- 

 tural functions. Adopting this explanation as the basis of our 

 observations, we shall find that according to the probable or 

 even possible augmentation of a viscus, so are its peritoneal at- 

 tachments. The stomach, which next to the uterus enlarges 

 more than any other viscus, gets ils subsidiary supply of perito- 

 neum from the length of the omentum minus and majus; the 

 colon, which is next in order, is supplied from the length of its 

 mesocolon ; the small intestines, which are next, from the length 

 of the mesentery. The latter, however, would be too long for 

 that simple purpose; but the objection is removed by recollect- 

 ing that the mesentery has also to accommodate numerous 

 chains of lacteal glands, through which the chyle must pass in 

 its elaboration, before it is fit to enter into the general circula- 

 tion. The liver, being of a size almost stationary, has its peri- 

 toneal attachments proportionally short; and its peritoneal co- 

 vering, from the shortness of the connecting cellular substance, 

 is disqualified from sliding. The spleen is in the same predica- 

 ment with the liver, except that its size is not stationary; but, 

 in this case, the peritoneum presents a phenomenon entirely re- 

 markable: it wrinkles upon the contraction of the spleen. 



If this mode of reasoning, derived, from an arrangement of 

 parts which no one denies, be correct, it follows that physiolo- 

 gists have erred sadly in the supposed uses of the omentum ma- 



