INFLAMMATION. 407 



3. INFLAMMATION OF NERVE-TISSUE. 



Inflammation of nerve-tissue is characterized by occurrences 

 very similar to those observed in inflammation of connective 

 tissue. All varieties of nerve-tissue the gray substance, the 

 ganglionic elements, the medullated and non-medullated nerve- 

 fibers first break down into medullary corpuscles, identical with 

 those which in embryonal development took part in the produc- 

 tion of nerve-tissue. 



The first step of the inflammatory changes in nerves, as in 

 muscle-tissue, always starts in the supporting and accompanying 

 connective tissue, which, being the carrier of blood-vessels, reacts 

 most promptly to the irritation. Next follows the proliferation 

 of inflammatory corpuscles arising from the nervous tissue, and 

 the sum of the inflammatory new formation, so long as the 

 continuity of the corpuscles remains unbroken, results in the 

 production of a dense, indistinctly fibrous connective tissue, 

 establishing the condition of sclerosis in the tissues of the nerve- 

 centers. Later, shrinkage of the newly formed connective tissue 

 causes retractions on the surface of the brain, which process H. 

 Kundrat terms porencephalitis. 



Should the inflammatory corpuscles break apart in the early 

 stages of inflammation, the result will be a complete destruction 

 of the tissue involved L e., the formation of an abscess. The 

 wall of the abscess, again, may be built up by newly formed 

 connective tissue. Such a combination of a formative and 

 destructive inflammatory process is well illustrated by the fol- 

 lowing article : 



MICROSCOPICAL STUDIES ON ABSCESS OF THE BRAIN. BY H. G. 

 BEYER, M. D., P. A. SURGEON U. S. NAVY.* 



The subject of my studies is a brain, the history of which is published in 

 the Transactions of the New York Pathological Society, vol. i., edited by 

 JohnC. Peters, M.D. 



At a meeting of this society, held on January 13, 1875, Dr. J. Lewis 

 Smith presented a specimen with the history, which is briefly as follows : 



" Maggie, aged two years and six months, seemed in good health, was 

 plump and well developed. On the evening of December 5th, she ate her 

 supper as usual, and was placed in her crib, apparently in perfect health. At 

 3 A. M. she was found in severe general ecclampsia. The general spasmodic 



* "Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease," July. 1880. The essay is here reprinted 

 in abstract. The term " protoplasm " is changed into that of " bioplasson." 



