90 ORGANS OF GENERATION. 



lacunae;* Loder has marked about sixty-five: there is one par- 

 ticularly large in the upper surface of the fossa navicularis, 

 which, it is said, has stopped the point of a bougie, and been 

 mistaken for stricture, j- 



Mr. Shaw has described a set of vessels immediately on the 

 outside of the internal membrane of the urethra ; which, when 

 empty, are very similar in appearance to muscular fibres. He 

 says, he has discovered that these vessels form an internal 

 spongy body, which passes down to the membranous part of 

 the uretha, and forms even a small bulb there.J. His prepara- 

 tion, being a quicksilver injection of the part, is certainly a very 

 satisfactory demonstration of its existence ; yet, in my own ob- 

 servations, where the blow-pipe has been resorted to, it has ra- 

 ther appeared to me to be the cellular membrane connecting 

 the canal of the urethra with the corpus spongiosum. 



The arteries of the penis come from the internal pudic; some 

 of its veins follow the course of the arteries, and others collect 

 into the two venae dorsales penis ; the nerves come from the in- 

 ternal and external pudics. 



SECT. II. OF THR MUCOUS GLANDS AND APPARATUS. 



The Seminal Vesicles (Vesicula Seminales) are two convo- 

 luted tubes, one on each side, two inches in length, placed on 

 the lower fundus of the bladder, between it and the rectum, 

 and behind the prostate gland. At their anterior extremities 

 they approach very nearly to each other, being only separated 

 by the intervention of the vasa deferentia. They are fixed to 

 the bladder, and surrounded by a thick mass of adipose and 

 cellular matter, with many blood vessels, principally veins, 

 passing through it. 



When inflated and dried, they present the semblance of cells, 

 but are, in fact, long tubes; which being convoluted, are re- 



* Tabula Anat. 



f Sir Everard Home formerly communicated to the Royal Society a highly in- 

 teresting paper on the structure of the lining- membrane of the urethra. From 

 his microscopical observations he is induced to think that it is muscular. 



t Med. Chir. Trans vol. x. 



