

THE THYROID GLAND. 181 



transparent cells of 0*004 — 0*006'", with simple nuclei ; whilst 

 the space surrounded by these cells is occupied with a clear, 

 somewhat viscous fluid, 



with a tinge of vellow in F,g ' 240, 



its colour, the behaviour 

 of which towards alcohol 

 and nitric acid and when 

 the gland is boiled, clearly 

 manifests the presence of 

 much albumen. This is 

 the character of the con- 

 tents in the healthy thy- 

 roid gland of Man, par- V f- a 

 ticularly in children; if ,/ ^ 

 the organ, however, is but 

 very little altered, condi- 

 tions, in many respects 



different, are presented. Very frequently, instead of a regular 

 epithelium, nothing is met with but a fluid mixed with minute, 

 clearer or darker granules and free nuclei ; although I am 

 ignorant whether this condition of the contents does not take 

 place until after death, or whether it is to be . regarded as 

 abnormal. For we so frequently observe, in the granular 

 fluid, a greater or less number of the same cells, which at other 

 times exist as epithelium, often pale and as if half dissolved, that 

 it is impossible to avoid the conclusion, that in these cells we 

 have an instance of that post mortem decomposition, so fre- 

 quently observed in the human subject. On the other hand, 

 the pathological nature of the change in the thyroid body and its 

 vesicles, termed colloid, cannot be doubted, although this morbid 

 condition is so frequent, in certain minor degrees, that many 

 authors enumerate it under the physiological occurrences. In 

 this degeneration, there is deposited in the gland vesicles, which 

 increase in size at the same time, the colloid substance, which 

 also occurs in other situations, in the form of transparent, 

 amorphous, light yellowish, soft, solid, masses, by which they 

 are more or less filled. In the lesser degrees of this change, 



Fig. 240. Some gland-vesicles from the thyroid gland of a Child, x 250 diam.: 

 «, connective tissue hetween them ; b, memhrane of the gland-vesicles ; c, their 

 epithelium. 



