OEGANS OF THE BODY. 



503 



may be called into being artificially by the administration of very rich fatty 

 food to an animal. In very well marked specimens considerable masses of 

 fat are to be seen filling the whole of the cell, and completely obscuring its 

 nucleus. The cells in such cases are often increased in size. Amongst 

 adults, and especially after habitual indulgence in rich food, such fatty 

 livers are of frequent occurrence. 



But besides this fatty infiltration, as it may be called, of the hepatic 

 cells, which the latter are well able to tolerate, regaining their previously 

 normal condition as soon as freed 

 from the oily molecules, there is 

 also a true fatty degeneration, a 

 morbid change of the whole ele- 

 ment into lardy matter, which 

 leads to its entire destruction. 



The arrangement of the cells 

 of the lobules is very remarkable. 

 They are placed in long rows 

 side by side and connected with 

 one another at points, without 

 by any means being fused to- 

 gether. This arrangement, in 

 elongated groups, may be fre- 

 quently recognised among hepatic 

 cells which have been scraped 

 off the cut surface of the liver 

 (fig. 498), but more clearly in 

 delicate sections of the lobules, 

 as in fig. 499, in which a radiat- 

 ing arrangement of the bands of elements is perfectly manifest, especially 

 in the more internal part, while externally this is more or less lost, the 

 cells being disposed with greater irregularity. 



In the human and mammalian liver generally, the cells of such a band 

 are arranged in a single row, only doubled at certain points. Much variety 

 exists, however, in the mode of grouping. 



These so-called lobules, which do not, however, like the well-known 

 divisions of racemose glands, open into an execretory duct, but are 

 placed on a twig of the hepatic vein, are separated 

 one from the other (at those points at which they 

 are seen sharply defined) by distinct septa of 

 connective-tissue, which may be isolated from 

 about the lobules in the form of regular capsules. 

 This mesh-work of connective-tissue is derived, 

 in the first place, from the so-called capsule of 

 Glisson, i.e., that sheath of cellular tissue which 

 clothes the blood-vessels and bile ducts, entering 

 the organ at the porta hepatis, and again from the 

 connective -tissue covering the whole organ. In the normal condition 

 of the human liver this septal connective -tissue, dividing lobule from 

 lobule, is very scanty, while, in a certain peculiar affection of the organ, 

 known as cirrhosis, it becomes hypertrophied. 



263. 



In order to gain a farther insight into the structure of the organ, it will 

 33 



499. Hepatic lobule from a child ten years old 

 (copied from Ecker), with the central hepatic vein 

 in transverse section. 



Fie. 500. Cells from a fatty 

 liver, a, 6, filled with smal 

 oily particles and globules 

 c, c/, with larger drops. 



