OF PERSPIRATION. 127 



months from birth, are constantly growing, though most in 

 summer, anil are constantly being shed, but particularly in win* 

 ter, till the thirty-sixth year, after which they are never shed, 

 but continue to grow, so that in this man's father, who is eighty 

 years of age and lives in Suffolk, they are of very great length. 

 They are set so close together, that their tops form a tolerable 

 surface, unless they are separated by extending the skin. Nearest 

 those parts which are natural, they gradually become smaller. 

 The glans penis should have been excepted by Blumenbach as 

 well as the scalp, face, palms, and soles. 



(B) Although Dr.Gordon* and Mr.Lawrence f assert that they 

 have never been able to detach any thing from the cutis of Euro- 

 peans in the form of a distinct membrane, the rete Malpighianum 

 does exist in Negroes, and the latter gentleman allows that the 

 various complexions of Europeans and the peculiar cream white 

 of the Albino who has unquestionably no colouring matter in his 

 eyes or skin, show that it exists even in us. 



(C) The illustrious Dr .Wells describes the singular case of a man 

 whose hair fell off throughout his body in about six weeks, without 

 any evident cause or derangement of health. He always looked 

 afterwards as if just shaved, and by wearing a wig would not 

 have been noticed for any peculiar appearance. J 



(D) The functions of the skin are but imperfectly known. 

 Besides forming a watery secretion (193 sq.) § and producing 



_. ■ — — — ' 



* System of Anatomy. Vol. i. p. 242. 



f Rees s Cyclopaedia, art. Integuments. 



X Transactions of a Society for the Improvement of Medical and Surgical 

 Knowledge, vol. ii. 



§ Lavoisier and Seguin {Me'moires de V Academic des Sciences. 1790. p. 610) 

 inclosed the body in a silk bag varnished with elastic gmn, having a small 

 opening carefully cemented around the mouth, so that by weighing the body 

 previously and subsequently to the experiment, they were able to ascertain 

 exactly what had been lost by vapour, and by subtracting from this loss the 

 weight of the perspired contents of the bag, they also ascertained how much of 

 this had passed off by the lungs. From repeated trials they found the mean 



