362 ABSORPTION. 



chyle, many of the molecules are lost sight of, and oil- 

 drops appear in their place, as if the investments of the 

 molecules had been dissolved, and their oily contents had 

 run together. 



Except these molecules, the chyle taken from the villi 

 or from lacteals near them, contains no other solid or 

 organized bodies. The fluid in which the molecules float 

 is albuminous, and does not spontaneously coagulate, 

 though coagulable by the addition of ether. But as the 

 chyle passes on towards the thoracic duct, and especially 

 while it traverses one or more of the mesenteric glands 

 (propelled by forces which have been described with the 

 structure of the vessels), it is elaborated. The quantity of 

 molecules and oily particles gradually diminishes ; cells, to 

 which the name of chyle-corpuscles is given, are developed 

 in it ; and by the formation of fibrin, it acquires the pro- 

 perty of coagulating spontaneously. The higher in the 

 thoracic duct the chyle advances, the more is it, in all 

 these respects, developed ; the greater is the number of 

 chyle-corpuscles, and the larger and firmer is the clot 

 which forms in it when withdrawn and left at rest. Such 

 a clot is like one of blood, without the red corpuscles, 

 having the chyle-corpuscles entangled in it, and the fatty 

 matter forming a white creamy film on the surface of the 

 serum. But the clot of chyle is softer and moister than 

 that of blood. Like blood, also, the chyle often remains 

 for a long time in its vessels without coagulating, but 

 coagulates rapidly on being removed from them (Bouisson). 

 The existence of fibrin, or of the materials which, by their 

 union, form it (p. 73 et seq.\ is, therefore, certain ; its 

 increase appears to be commensurate with that of the 

 corpuscles ; and, like them, it is not absorbed as such from 

 the chyme (for no fibrin exists in the chyle in the villi), 

 but is gradually elaborated out of the albumen which chyle, 

 in its earliest condition, contains. ' 



The structure of the chyle-corpuscles was described 



