188 EXTRACTS AND ABSTRACTS FROM FOREIGN JOURNALS. 



[From the Gazette des Hopitaux, 1842.] 



M . Borjery on the Microscopic Anatomy of the Spleen in Man and the 

 Mammifera. From the anatomical structure of the spleen, and the 

 appearance of the fluid contained in its vesicles as shown by the 

 microscope, the following propositions may be advanced respecting the 

 functions of this organ : these propositions although not positively in- 

 dicating the whole service of the spleen, point out the path to its 

 determination. 



1st. The spleen appears to be an organ of sanguineous elaboration 

 and consists of two different structures. 



a. A secretory vesicular apparatus operating directly on the arterial 

 blood, the product which is absorbed by the veins being only a prepara- 

 tory step towards another elaboration. This should have its seat in the 

 liver, where the splenic fluid is carried along with the venous blood of 

 the digestive organs. 



b. A lymphatic apparatus on the one hand, acting on the blood fur- 

 nished to it by the numerous little glandular arteries, and on the other 

 on the fluid residues of the elaboration of the vesicular apparatus, con- 

 veyed to it by the lymphatics. 



2dly. These two portions or structures do not appear to be connected 

 anatomically, and juxtaposed organule to organule, save in the point of 

 exercising a common function. The venous residues of the two por- 

 tions go equally to the Liver, whilst the mere residue of the lymphatic 

 glands is transported in the apparatus of the same name. 



3rdly. The analogy of texture between the spleen and the lymphatic 

 glands though not affording evident proof, admits of the legitimate 

 assumption that these two organs can up to a certain point supply the 

 place of each other, and which explains the want of fatality when the 

 former is extirpated. 



Ehrenberg on the Perception of the Smallest Bright Bodies. On 

 pressing small globules of quicksilver on a glass micrometer, he easily 

 obtained smaller globules of y^Q-th to g^pth of a line in diameter. In 

 the sunshine he could only discern the reflection of light, and the ex- 

 istence of such globules as were ^-oth of a line in diameter with the 

 naked eye ; smaller ones did not affect his eye either in sunshine or 

 with a Chevalier's reverberatory lamp. He however remarked, at the 

 same time, that the actual bright part of the globule did not amount to 

 more than g-J-gth of a line in diameter. Spider-threads of 2 Q 00 '" in 

 diameter were still discernible from their lustre. Poggendorff's Annalen, 

 in Taylor' s Scientific Memoirs, Vol. I, p. 583. 



Pappenheim on the Ligament of the Velum Palati. It is easy to see 

 with the naked eye that there is a white streak on the anterior median 



