100 



PANCREAS. 



served for the transit of the chyle from the 

 intestine to the liver and spleen. Very early 

 investigation, however, showed the fallacy 

 of this view, as it proved that the fluid of 

 which the pancreatic duct was the channel 

 always passed to the intestine and never front 

 it. The fourth opinion is ascribed to Ves- 

 lingius, who says, in speaking of the pan- 

 creas*, Usus hujus canalis obscurus non est, 

 ncnn cum acrem quendam fellique non dissi- 

 milem succum exhibeat, palam est excreinentum 

 tale, per coctionem ulterior em a chylo separatum, 

 allici infra hunc atque in duodenum intcstinum 

 expurgari. This view, which is simply re- 

 futed by saying that the secretion obtained 

 from the pancreas does not in any way resemble 

 bile, that it is not " felli non dissimilem," was 

 supported by Asellius. Riolanus, and others. 

 De Graaf accounts for it by supposing that 

 the tube introduced into the duct for the 

 purpose of obtaining the secretion became 

 covered with the bile accumulated about the 

 common orifice of the two ducts, which it 

 might very well do, either on being inserted 

 or withdrawn, and that this, becoming mixed 

 with the pancreatic secretion which it had 

 withdrawn, gave rise to the erroneous opinion 

 that that secretion had a resemblance to bile. 

 The fourth opinion, that the pancreatic duct 

 was the excretory canal of the spleen, which 

 was maintained by Bartholini, is refuted by 

 the simplest anatomical considerations, and 

 was further disproved by De Graaf, who, to 

 show its fallacy, extirpated the spleen of a 

 dog, and, two months after the extirpation, 

 obtained the pancreatic secretion unaltered. 

 The fifth view was based on similar supposed 

 anatomical relations between the pancreatic 

 duct and spleen. It is assigned to Lindanus, 

 and was refuted by the same considerations 

 as the last. The theory that the pancreas 

 carried off the excretion of the nerves was 

 based on the old view that the nerves distilled 

 the animal humours and spirits. AH these 

 views are perhaps rather amusing than in- 

 teresting, and are among the curiosities of 

 science. They show us how much our me- 

 dical forefathers were disposed to take for 

 granted, and how disposed they were to run 

 alone when the shell was still on their heads. 

 The true doctrine that the pancreas furnished 

 an important secretion of its own was first 

 advocated by Francois de le Boe Sylvius -f-, 

 who first insisted on its acidity, and who at- 

 tached great importance to its pathological 

 conditions. Indeed, he made its derangements 

 the cause of nearly all the ills that flesh is 

 heir to ; in the same way that Spigelius did 

 his lobe of the liver. It was in consequence 

 of the interest which the lessons of Silvius 

 excited that De Graaf, his pupii, undertook 

 his admirable researches De Succo Pancrea- 

 t>co, and succeeded, in 1662, in first obtaining 

 the pancreatic secretion from the living ani- 

 mal : the most important point was thus 

 ascertained, and the materials supplied for 

 further investigation. 



* Syntagma Anatom. cap. 4. 



t Tlies. 37., De Usu Lienis et glandular. 



With the view of obtaining the fluid, De 

 Graaf first put a ligature round the duo- 

 denum, including part of the pancreas, but 

 failed in obtaining the desired result, in con- 

 sequence, as he imagined, of the ligature 

 about the pancreas cutting off the supply 

 of blood from which the secretion was ob- 

 tained, and so putting a stop to it. He 

 then put a ligature round the duct at the 

 point of its immergence into the intestine, 

 but again failed in getting any secretion, 

 which he attributes to its escape by the small 

 ducts wounded in exposing the larger one. 

 His third attempt consisted in binding together 

 two pieces of wood, compressing the intestine 

 over the point of entrance of the duct so as 

 to close it. This time he was successful : 

 the duct was distended with a clear and 

 limpid fluid, but he could not obtain it in 

 sufficient quantity to subject it to any ex- 

 amination. With the view of obtaining sonic 

 notable quantity, he instituted a fourth ex- 

 periment by making a longitudinal incision 

 into the duodenum, and inserting into the 

 orifice of the duct the narrow mouth of a 

 little flask ; but again he failed, from the air 

 included in the flask barring the entrance of 

 the secretion. To obviate this, in his fifth 

 experiment he perforated the upper part of 

 the flask with a little hole, and this time he 

 succeeded, in the space of five hours, in get- 

 ting the flask more than half full. But the 

 secretion obtained was bitter in taste and 

 yellow in colour, and, attributing this to a 

 certain admixture of bile from the uncleansed 

 intestine, he improvised the following in- 

 genious apparatus to obviate that source 

 of fallacy. He took a long-necked flask, 

 with a hole bored in the upper part of its 

 belly, and around the neck of this flask he 

 fastened a cord furnished with rings, by 

 means of which it could be firmly fastened to 

 the intestine ; a quill of a wild duck, cut so 

 as to form a little slender tube, was then 

 fixed into the neck of the flask, and made to 

 fit tightly by pasted paper being rolled round 

 it. Into the smaller extremity of this quill 

 tube was fixed a plug made of some soft 

 wood fitting sufficiently tight not to be forced 

 in by the pressure of the soft parts it would 

 come in contact with, but sufficiently easy to 

 be withdrawn by a string fastened to it, and 

 which passed through the quill into the flask 

 and out of the flask through the little hole. 

 The object of the plug was to prevent the in- 

 testinal contents from blocking up the quill and 

 so obstructing the flow of the pancreatic secre- 

 tion. Then (" sublato ejulatu vicinis molesto, 

 duarum laryngis cartilaginum particulas ex- 

 scindendo," as he says of the poor dog with 

 great simplicity and coolness) the abdominal 

 cavity is laid open, an incision is made into 

 the duodenum, the quill, closed with the little 

 plug, inserted, the flask sewed to the intestine 

 by means of the rings, the parietes sewed up 

 so as to allow the protrusion of the flask, 

 the plug withdrawn by the string, and the flask 

 covered so as to prevent the entry of any 

 foreign matter through the little hole. To 



