THE GENERAL STRUCTURE. 133 



U{), or doubling upon itself, at its lowest part. The upper 

 edge is tied to the bottom of the stomach, to the spleen, as 

 has already been observed, and to part of the duodenum 

 The reflected edge also, after forming the doubling,, comes 

 up behind the front flap, and is tied to the colon and ad- 

 joining viscera. =* 



9. The septa of the brain probably prevent one part of 

 the organ from pressing w^ith too great a weight upon an- 

 other part. The processes of the dura mater divide the 

 cavity of the skull, like so many inner partition walls, and 

 thereby confine each hemisphere and lobe of the brain to the 

 chamber which is assigned to it, without its being liable to 

 rest upon or intermix with the neighboring parts. The 

 great art and caution of packing is to prevent one thing 

 hurting another. This, in the head, the chest, and the ab- 

 domen of an animal body is, among other methods, provided 

 for by membranous partitions and wrappings, which keep 

 the parts separate. 



The above may serve as a short account of the manner 

 in which the principal viscera are sustained in their places. 

 "But of the provisions for this purpose, by far, in my opinion, 

 the most curious, and where also such a provision was mos^ 

 wanted, is in the guts. It is pretty evident that a long 

 narrow tube — in man, about five times the length of the 

 body — laid from side to side in folds upon one' another, wind- 

 ing in oblique and circuitous directions, composed also of a 

 soft and yielding substance, must, without some extraordi- 

 nary precaution for its safety, be continually displaced by 

 the various, sudden, and abrupt motions of the body which 

 contains it. I should expect that, if not bruised or wound- 

 ed by every fall, or leap, or twist, it would be entangled, or 

 t>3 involved with itself; or, at the least, shpped and shaken 

 out of the order in which it is disposed, and which order is 

 necessary to be preserved for the carrying on of the ira]>or- 

 tant functions which it has to execute in the animal econo- 

 * Ches. Anat., p. 1G7. 



