278 DIGESTION. 



deep extremities, which are lined throughout by cylinder- 

 epithelium (fig. 70, .), and probably serve only for the 

 secretion of mucus. 



All the tubular glands, while they open by one end into 

 the cavity of the stomach, rest by their blind extremities 

 on a bed or matrix of dense areolar tissue (fig. 69), which 

 is prolonged upwards between them, so as to invest and 

 support them. The matrix contains a variable quantity 

 of unstriped muscular fibres. 



Lenticular glands. Besides the cylindrical glands, there 

 are also small closed sacs beneath the surface of the 

 mucous membrane, resembling exactly the solitary glands 

 of the intestine, to be described hereafter. Their num- 

 ber is very variable, and they are found chiefly along 

 the lesser curvature of the stomach, and in the pyloric 

 region, but they may be present in any part of the organ. 

 According to Dr. Brinton they are rarely absent in children. 

 Their function probably resembles that of the intestinal 

 solitary glands, but nothing is certainly known regarding it. 



The blood-vessels of the stomach, which first break up 

 in the submucous tissue, send branches upward between 

 the closely packed glandular tubes, anastomosing around 

 them by means of a fine capillary network with oblong 

 meshes. Continuous with this deeper plexus, or prolonged 

 upwards from it, so to speak, is a more superficial network 

 of larger capillaries, which branch densely around the 

 orifices of the tubes, and form the framework on which are' 

 moulded the small elevated ridges of mucous membrane 

 bounding the minute, polygonal pits before referred to. 

 From this superficial network the veins chiefly take their 

 origin. Thence passing down between the tubes, with no 

 very free connection with the deeper inter-tubular capillary 

 plexus, they open finally into the venous network in the 

 submucous tissue. 



The nerves of the stomach are derived from the pneuino- 

 gastric and sympathetic. 



