OP THE GENITAL FUNCTION IN MAN. 317 



and causes of its accomplishment is no easy matter. 

 For I am every day more convinced that neither of the 

 powers to which it is usually ascribed, viz. the action 

 of the cremaster or diaphragm, or the mere contractility 

 of the cellular membrane, interwoven with tendinous 

 fibres, which adheres to the cylindrical process of pe- 

 ritonaeum (512) and is called the Hunterian gubernacu- 

 lum, is sufficient to explain so singular a movement, 

 and least of all to explain the transit of the testis 

 through the passage so often mentioned ; but that the 

 whole affords, if any thing does, a striking illustration 

 of a vita propria, without the peculiar influence of 

 which, so remarkable and unique a course, similar to 

 no other function of the system, cannot even be ima- 

 gined.(C) 



519. The coats of the testes, after their descent, are 

 conveniently divided into common and proper. 



The common is the scrotum, consisting of the skin 

 having a very moderate substratum of fat and differing 

 from the rest of the integuments in this, — that it is con- 

 tinually changing its appearance, being sometimes lax 

 and pendulous, sometimes (especially during the vene- 

 real orgasm and the application of cold) constricted 

 and rigid, and, in the latter case, singularly marked by 

 rugae and furrows. 



520. With respect to the coats proper to each testis, 

 the dartos lies immediately under the scrotum, and is 

 endowed with a peculiar and strong contractile power, 

 which deceived the celebrated Winslow, Haller, &c. 

 into the belief of the presence of muscularity. (D) 



521. Next to this, with the intervention however of 

 much soft cellular substance, are found three orders of 



