THE LIVER. 



113 



Fig. 218. 



section of the liver is gently kneaded with the fingers in water, 

 and then washed and examined on a black ground, in which 

 case many compartments remain almost completely closed, and 

 still more resemble closed capsules. It must not be supposed, 

 however, that there are any complete special investments 

 around each hepatic lobule. On the other hand, the membranes 

 by which they are formed, always appertain to many lobules in 

 common, so that the whole constitutes a cellulated substance con- 

 tinuous throughout, whose partitions are all simple and cannot 

 be divided into a number of lamellae. If we trace out the capsules, 

 or as they might better be termed, 

 the partitions of the lobes, we find 

 that they are, for the most part, ex- 

 pansions of the connective tissue, 

 which accompanies the vena 

 porta, §•<?., or of the so-called 

 capsule of Glisson, but are also 

 connected with the serous in- 

 vestment of the liver and ac- 

 company the larger hepatic veins. 

 Kiernan was the first to take a 

 just view of the relation of the 

 lobules to the hepatic vessels, 

 when he said, that they are seated 

 upon the branches of the hepatic 

 vein, like leaves upon their stalk. 

 In fact we find, if a small 

 branch of the hepatic vein be slit 

 up, (fig. 218, bbb) that it is surrounded on all sides by the 

 hepatic lobules and receives a single vein from each, so that they 

 actually appear to be attached to it by short pedicles. Now 

 since this takes place in exactly the same manner from the 

 veins of moderate size up to the intra-lobular veins, the 

 hepatic veins and lobules may, not without reason, be compared 

 to a tree whose branches are so numerous and so closely beset 

 with polygonal leaves that the foliation, so to speak, consti- 

 tutes one mass. Imagine now, that another ramified system, 



Fig. 218. Segment of a Pig's liver, with an hepatic vein laid open, somewhat 

 magnified : a, large vein, into which as yet no intralobular veins open ; b, its branches, 

 with intralobular veins, and the bases of the lobes shining through. After Kiernan. 

 ii. 8 



