252 LECTURE X. 



cisely the cases, in the majority of which extensive alte- 

 rations are discovered in certain organs or in individual 

 parts. I cannot assert that investigation has in this mat- 

 ter in any way been pushed to its utmost limits, I can 

 only say that every resource afforded by microscopical 

 or chemical analysis has hitherto been fruitlessly em- 

 ployed in investigating the part played by the blood in 

 these processes ; and that, on the other hand, we are in 

 most of them able to demonstrate important changes in 

 larger or smaller groups of the ultimate constituents of 

 organs ; and that on the whole the probability that the 

 dyscrasia should in these instances also be regarded as 

 secondary, and as derived from definite points in organs, 

 becomes stronger every day. I shall have to examine 

 this question a little more closely when I come to con- 

 sider the theory of the propagation of malignant tumours, 

 in the case of which recourse is, you know, so often had 

 to the supposition that the malignancy has its root in the 

 blood which gives rise to the local affections. And yet 

 it is precisely in the course of these processes that it is 

 comparatively most easy to show the mode of propaga- 

 tion, both in the immediate neighbourhood of the dis- 

 eased part, and in remote organs ; and it is in them we 

 find, that there is one circumstance which especially 

 favours the extension of such processes, namely the 

 abundance of parenchymatous juices in the pathological 

 formation. The drier a new formation is, the less in 

 general are its powers of infecting, both nearer and more 

 distant parts. The mode of propagation itself commonly 

 entirely agrees with what we have already said ; first of 

 all, a conveyance of the morbid matter though the 

 lymphatic channels, and then an affection of the lymph- 

 atic glands, takes place, and it is only by degrees that 

 processes of a similar nature declare themselves in more 

 remote organs. Or the process may here too in the first 



