OF THE NERVES IN GENERAL, 



stance of a nerve, either by excision, or in a contused wound 

 with destruction, there remains a large interval between the 

 two ends of a nerve, and the functions are never re-established, 

 whatever may be the affected nerve ; which is sufficient to prove 

 that the anastomoses are of no avail, when the re-establishment 

 of the functions takes place. 



We may then conclude that nerves divided reunite; and 

 that when the reunion does not take place, it depends only on 

 the distant separation of the extremities, brought about by the 

 motions of the parts, or by a loss of substance. 



788. When a nerve has been divided, there takes place 

 during the first days, about the ends, at their surface, and in 

 their interval, an exudation of organizable matter; the sur- 

 rounding cellular tissue is penetrated by the same matter, and 

 has lost its permeability. In this state the ends of the nerve 

 are simply agglutinated together, and to the surrounding parts; 

 the functions are still suspended as they were immediately 

 after the division; the two ends of the nerve, which are swol- 

 len, especially the superior, the surrounding cellular tissue, 

 and the organizable matter, take more consistence, and become 

 very vascular. In this state, which continues some time, the 

 two ends of the nerve are united by an organized vascular sub- 

 stance; but there is still no communication, of nervous action 

 between the two ends. After a time the surrounding cellular 

 tissue ceases to be compact and vascular; the intervening sub- 

 stance, more or less long, according to the kind of wound and 

 the concomitant circumstances, diminishes by degrees in 

 volume, consistence, and redness; takes the appearance and 

 texture of nerve (a texture established by the application made 

 by Meyer of nitric acid to the nervous cicatrix) departing from 

 the extremities to the middle of their interval, and finishes by 

 fulfilling the functions, so much the sooner, and so much the 

 more exactly, as there was no interval between the ends of the 

 nerve, as in the case of ligature, or a very small one, as in the 

 case of simple section, or of a very short excision in a part 

 little subject to motion. On the contrary, when the interval 

 is considerable, the reunion does not take place, or it takes 

 place only by a cellular tissue which does not acquire, at a 



