Mode of Contraction of Voluntary Muscular Fibre. 111 
pu apereevoir dans ces fils une marche vraiment ondée, et il m’a 
paru que les petites taches curvilignes du faisceau primitif étoient 
formées par les petits signes, ou diaphragmes, des fils charnus 
primitifs.” (Pl. VII. fig. 2.) 
Sir Everard Home and Mr. Bauer took up the microscopical 
investigation of muscular fibre in 1818 and again in 1826. Un- 
fortunately for science they fell into remarkable errors. Their 
observations retarded rather than advanced the microscopic ana- 
tomy of muscle, and raised doubts as to the credibility of any 
conclusions drawn from microscopic observations. 
Sir Everard Home and Mr. Bauer*, seeing the tendency which 
blood-corpuscles have to unite in a longitudinal series, fancied it 
highly probable that the fibrillee of striated muscle were formed 
in the same manner. Sir Everard states that the particles of the 
fibrillee are of the same diameter as the blood-corpuscles deprived 
of their colour ; he supposes Leuwenhoek’s assertion, that muscle 
is composed of globules of less diameter than the blood-corpuscles, 
incorrect, and he endeavours to account for this supposed mistake 
by adducing the fact, that Leuwenhoek never possessed a micro- 
meter. 
_ Mr. Skey, in a paper in the ‘ Philosophical Transactions,’ sets 
forth as his opinion, that each muscular fibre is a tube, contain- 
ing in its interior a semi-transparent amorphous substance; the 
tube he supposes to be composed of fibrille, and the transverse 
striz to be depressions on the surface of the fibre. 
The views of Miiller, Schwann, -Lauth and Henle are very 
similar to those advanced by Fontana. 
_ Schwann considers the fibrille to be beaded filaments, pre- 
senting under the microscope a succession of dark points sepa- 
rated by light and somewhat narrower portions of the fibril. 
Dr. Martin Barry holds the structure of muscle to be spiral ; 
he says each fibril is composed. of two spirals coiling in opposite 
directions. ad dela 
From these observers I shall pass to those who in recent times 
have examined the fibrillee of muscle, with a view to determining 
the real constitution of these filaments. 
The publication of Mr. Bowman’s paper in the ‘ Philosophical 
Transactions’ was an era in the microscopy of muscle, though he 
does not seem to have been able to make out the ultimate con- 
stitution of the fibrille, which he considered were composed of a 
series of highly refracting particles of one kind ; he thus describes 
them :— 
‘Fibrille present alternate dark and light points when the 
* Philosophical Transactions, 1818 and 1826. 
