FIBRINOTJS EXUDATIONS. 433 



quaint ed with mucous membranes, where fib*mous ex- 

 udations are of pretty frequent occurrence, for example, 

 the mucous membrane of the respiratory organs. But 

 we know also that free (superficial) fibrinous exudations 

 are scarcely to be met with on the mucous membrane 

 of the digestive tract, and that they at most accompany 

 the more serious, and especially the gangrenous and 

 specific forms. When laryngitis is spoken of, the pre- 

 sence of croup is not immediately inferred. In a case 

 of cystitis, we do not expect to find the inner surface of 

 the bladder covered with a fibrinous layer. In the 

 whole series of so-called gastric inflammations we find, 

 especially at the commencement of the process, scarcely 

 anything more than an abundant secretion of mucus. 

 If therefore we still call these catarrhal inflammations, 

 inflammations, if we do not wish entirely to cast them 

 out of the class of inflammations, we must admit that 

 there may exist a. mucous as well as fibrinous exudation 

 in inflammations, and that the inflammations with a mu- 

 cous exudation form a special category, appertaining to 

 certain organs. For, as is well known, we do not find 

 them in all the tissues of the body, but nearly exclusively 

 on mucous membranes. 



If now you consider the fibrinous exudations a little 

 more closely, there can be no doubt at all, but. that in 

 this point they entirely agree with the mucous ones. 

 For we do not meet with fibrinous exudations in all 

 parts of the body ; we know of no form of exudative 

 encephalitis, for example, which furnishes a fibrinous 

 exudation. Just as little is there a form of hepatitis 

 known, in which fibrinous exudations occur. There is 

 indeed an inflammation of the investing membrane of 

 the liver (perihepatitis), just as there is an inflamma- 

 tion of the membrane of the brain, in which fibrine- 

 may be set free, but nobody has ever met with fibrine in 



28 



