104 BLOOD BIOPLASM. 



in the mucus corpuscle. The movements continue 

 for many hours after the blood has been withdrawn 

 from the body. The colourless as well as the red 

 blood-corpuscles vary much in size, although they are 

 often represented as if they were of uniform diameter. 

 These bioplasts multiply by giving off little diverti- 

 cula, which become detached, and then grow into 

 complete corpuscles. In the blood there are, besides 

 the white blood-corpusles, multitudes of minute 

 masses of living matter, probably composed of the 

 same material as the white blood-corpuscles. These 

 were described and figured by me in 1863, and I 

 showed that when the capillary walls became stretched 

 by distension they would escape through little 

 longitudinal rents or fissures into the spaces external 

 to the vessels, where, being freely supplied with 

 nutrient matter, they grew and multiplied, giving rise 

 to the numerous corpuscles seen in this situation in 

 inflammation. These minute particles are indeed the 

 most important constituents of inflammatory exuda- 

 tion, and are the agents by which the important 

 changes occurring in the exudation are effected. They 

 vary much in number in the blood and are very 

 abundant in inflammation. 



Whenever the circulation is carried on slowly in 

 any part of the body the colourless or white blood- 

 corpuscles grow and multiply, and at an early period 

 of development, before the heart and lungs are fully 

 formed, the only corpuscles are these white or colourless 



