478 ' WOUNDS. 



glazing, on the surface ; and this, if examined with the micro- 

 scope, will be found to contain an abundance of corpuscles, 

 having the appearance of the white corpuscles of the blood 

 imbedded in a fibrinous film. The collection of these corpuscles 

 on the surface of a wound, especially on wounded muscles and 

 fascisB, appears to depend on the peculiar adhesiveness which 

 they exhibit as soon as they are removed from the canal of 

 the healthy blood-vessel. The film increases slowly, and makes 

 the surface of the wound look as if covered wdth a thin 

 greyish or yellowish-white layer of buffy coat. This increase 

 of glazing is the prelude to the formation of granulations; but 

 while it is going on, and often for some days later, there is in 

 and about the wound an appearance of inaction — a calm in 

 which scarcely anything appears except a slight oozing of serous 

 fluid from the wound. These periods of repose after severe injury 

 may be the brooding time of either good or evil; whilst it 

 lasts, the mode of union of the wound will in many cases be 

 determined ; the healing may be perfected, or a slow, uncertain 

 process of repair may be just begun. Immediately after the 

 infliction of an injury, and during this period of calm, the 

 blood in the adjacent parts remains stagnant. During this 

 stagnation materials may ooze from the vessels, enough to form 

 the glazing of the wounded surfaces of certain parts ; but before 

 granulations can be formed the flow of blood must again begin, 

 and its supply must be increased. So it may be stated generally 

 that the first visible change which ensues after the period of calm 

 — the period of incubation, as it is called — is an increased supply 

 of blood to the parts in which repair is to ensue. 



That which next follows, after the increased afflux of blood, 

 is the production of the material to be organized into granula- 

 tions. This is added to, or perhaps displaces, the glazing 

 already existing upon some surfaces ; and where none exists, as 

 on fat or bone, the new material is accumulated on the bare 

 surface of the wound. Upon this process it has been remarked 

 by John Hunter that a white substance is one day seen, 

 exactly similar in every respect to coagulable lymph ; upon the 

 next day this substance has been found to contain blood-vessels 

 (to be vascular). This is granulation without suppuration, but 

 it is very rarely observed. 



The further development of the reparative material is very 



