CONNECTIVE TISSUE. 215 



from a few embryonal (medullary) corpuscles, or from a single 

 corpuscle. In the full-grown animal, on the contrary, the terri- 

 tory contains but one or a few cartilage corpuscles, the double 

 and triple formations, between which the basis-substance is very 

 scanty or even absent, while in the peripheral portion of the terri- 

 tory a large amount of basis-substance is found, which must have 

 originated from a corresponding large number of embryonal 

 (medullary) corpuscles. Although the cartilage corpuscles of very 

 young animals are decidedly smaller than those of the full-grown, 

 there is not the slightest evidence of a so-called " interstitial 

 growth," i. e., an increase of the bulk of the corpuscle as well as of 

 the basis-substance already formed. It is far more probable that 

 the embryonal cartilage is not the same formation from which 

 the cartilage of the adult arises j it certainly is not in the same loca- 

 tion as far as the size of the whole body is concerned. Besides, 

 a fully formed cartilage, or any other tissue, grows, during the 

 time that the cartilage is returning to the medullary condition, 

 only in limited places, when a new grouping of medullary cor- 

 puscles takes place, and a new basis-substance is developed. 



Those who maintain that an "interstitial" growth takes place, 

 forget that a cartilage corpuscle, once imbedded in the dense, 

 chondrogenous basis-substance, cannot increase in size unless a 

 liquefaction of the basis-substance has occurred, at least at the 

 borders of the cavity containing the corpuscle. The same objec- 

 tion can be raised against the hypothesis of the division of carti- 

 lage corpuscles in the fully developed tissue. The probability is 

 far greater that cartilage grows with the growth of the whole 

 body, from medullary corpuscles at the periphery, while the 

 central portions are reduced into medullary tissue for the benefit 

 of the growing bone-tissue. The " apposition theory" considered 

 in this light is the only legitimate one, as there is no difficulty in 

 understanding that from the perichondrium, or other peripheral 

 formations of connective tissue, always, of course, through the 

 intervening stage of medullary tissue, new cartilage is produced 

 during the whole period of development of the body. 



The process of development of cartilage with striated basis- 

 substance is materially the same as that of hyaline cartilage, as I 

 could trace on the lateral surfaces of the condyle of femur of 

 growing rabbits. Here we find intermediate striated cartilage 

 between the hyaline cartilage and the tendon or ligamentous 

 tissue ; and the intermediate striated portions may be found to 

 contain fields of hyaline cartilage. With such evidences it is not 



