272 HISTOLOGY OF THE MORBID PROCESSES. 



chymatous nephritis, Fig. 245). The spleen and lymphatic glands 

 are also exposed to an increased functional demand, and respond in 

 an increase of their active tissues, which may pass into degener- 

 ative conditions if the task be greater than they are able to cope 

 with successfully. 



In the other conditions in which albuminoid degeneration is 

 found the factors determining its causation appear less complicated 

 than in the fevers. Many of the acute inflammatory processes are 

 accompanied by a rise of temperature, due to the absorption of 

 poisons from the seat of the inflammation, and then the degenera- 

 tion will be more widely distributed than in those cases in which 

 the general reaction is less marked or entirely absent. But the 

 tissues immediately involved in the inflammatory process will suifer 

 in their nutrition, whether toxaemia be present or not, and in certain 

 of them the result will be a degeneration, while in others it will be 

 necrosis or death. In the case of albuminoid degeneration follow- 

 ing incomplete embolism the explanation is even simpler; for here 

 the nutrition is directly reduced by the mechanical effect of a partial 

 plugging of a bloodvessel. 



In all the cases in which albuminoid degeneration occurs in a 

 comparatively pure form the cause is an acute one i. e., the cells 

 are called upon to meet a sudden change of condition in their 

 activities and nutrition : the former being, as a rule, increased ; the 

 latter, probably always diminished. 



The explanation w^hich can be offered of the way in which fatty 

 degeneration is brought about is very similar to that already given 

 for albuminoid degeneration. 



In fatty degeneration the emergency which the cells have to meet 

 is less sudden than in albuminoid degeneration. The adverse con- 

 ditions to which they are subjected are more slowly developed, 

 though not necessarily less serious. The cells appear to be able to 

 accommodate themselves to a considerable extent to the abnormal 

 circumstances, but eventually their powers of metabolism are dis- 

 turbed and they are incapable of utilizing the less readily available 

 food-materials. When the organized proteids are then drawn upon 

 their nitrogen appears to be completely used, so that no residual 

 albuminoid substances are deposited in granular form, but a rem- 

 nant of the cytoplasm, free from nitrogen and taking the form of 

 fat, the least readily oxidized form of food, is left. If, now, the 

 oells continue to appropriate and utilize albuminoid food-material, 



