78 GLANDS IN HEALTH AND DISEASE 



gland, it would be hard to say. You will remember 

 that at the beginning of the chapter we stated that 

 the gland consists of two very distinct portions, 

 the cortex and the medulla. The latter, as we shall 

 wee, contains adrenaline, the best known of all the 

 homiones, and indeed a very important substance. 

 But evidence is accumulating to show that, the 

 medulla, which contains this hormone, is no more 

 important, if indeed as important, to life than is 

 the cortex, which does not contain adrenaline. 

 Biedl, a celebrated Austrian investigator, claims 

 to have succeeded in removing the cortex from 

 mammals, leaving behind the medulla intact; the 

 animals did not- survive. This leads him to the 

 view that the cortex, and not the medulla, is the 

 portion of the organ essential to life. Schafer, the 

 Edinburgh physiologist, has criticised Kiedl's con- 

 clusions because he considers it impossible to 

 separate completely the medulla from the cortex. 

 "I think," he writes, "the experience of most people 

 will lead them to believe such a separation impos- 

 sible." Yet the view docs persist, that the cortex, 

 if anything, is even more important to the body 

 than the medulla. 



What hormone, if any, the cortex contains, is not 

 clear. No substance corresponding to the adrena- 

 line of the medulla has been isolated from it. A 

 theory has, however, been advanced that the real 

 seat for the manufacture of adrenaline is the cor- 



