380 LECTURE XV. 



This is the manner in which the disintegration of 

 nearly all parts takes place, which essentially consist of 

 cells and naturally contain a good deal of fluid, as for 

 example pus among familiar pathological products 

 (p. 216, Fig. 66). If, on the contrary, the parts are in 

 themselves somewhat more rigid, so that movement in 

 and displacement of, the fatty mass takes place with less 

 facility, the fat remains in the form of the previous cell. 

 Of this we meet with an example in the fatty degenera- 

 tion of the walls of arteries. 



In the aorta, the carotids and the cerebral arteries, 

 changes of the inner coat are often seen with the naked 

 eye of such a nature, that small, whitish spots of a 

 rounded or angular form, occasionally running one 

 into the other, project somewhat above the surface. 

 If an incision is made at these spots, it is found that 

 they are quite superficial, that they lie in the innermost 

 layer of the internal coat and must not be confounded 

 with the really atheromatous condition. If such a spot 

 be cut out, it is found that a fatty degeneration of the 

 connective-tissue-corpuscles of the innermost coat has 

 taken place ; and since they are branched cells, we do 

 not here have granule-cells in their ordinary rounded 

 form, but often very long, fine bodies, which here and 

 there swell up into the form of a spindle or star, and in 

 which the fat-granules lie heaped up like strings of 

 pearls, whilst between there still remains intermediate 

 substance quite intact. It is the cellular elements of the 

 connective tissue which in these cases undergo the 

 change in their totality. Afterwards the intermediate 

 substance also softens, the cellular fat-granule masses 

 fall asunder, and the current of blood carries away the 

 particles of fat with it. In this way a number of un- 

 even places are produced upon the surface of the vessel. 

 which swell up as long as the process continues, after- 



