508 GENERAL ANATOMY. 



This communicating branch, similar at its origin, to the spinal 

 nerves, having arrived at about a line from the ganglions of 

 the sympathetic nerve, reddens and takes successively the 

 characters of this nerve. 



The ganglion of the fifth pair of nerves, or Gasser's gan- 

 glion, belongs evidently to the series of spinal ganglions, from 

 which it differs only in form. The white nervous fasciculi 

 which pass beneath, without forming a part of it, that Paletta 

 proposed to consider as particular nerves, resemble entirely 

 the anterior root of the spinal nerves. 



The ganglions of the par vagum and of the glosso-phargu- 

 geal nerve resemble as yet, in their form and texture, the 

 spinal ganglions. 



The trunk even of the par vagum has a texture altogether 

 peculiar and different from the other nerves, without resulting 

 however from a linear series of ganglions, as Reil says. It 

 greatly resembles the trunk of the sympathetic nerve. 



805. The second sort of ganglions comprehends the series 

 of three cervical ganglions, of twelve thoracic, of five lumbar, 

 and of four sacral, belonging on each side to the trunk of the 

 sympathetic nerve. The opthalmic ganglions, spheno-pala- 

 tine, and maxillary, are also of the same sort. The cardiac 

 ganglion, often replaced by a plexus, must be joined with 

 them, as well as the semi-lunar or cceliac ganglions, and many 

 others placed in the solar plexus and its divisions; the little 

 coccygeal ganglion, which is found sometimes at the union of 

 the two sympathetic nerves, opposite the summit of the sa- 

 crum; and the little palatine ganglion, which exists sometimes 

 in the anterior palatine foramen; finally some variable gan- 

 glions are also added, which are sometimes found upon the 

 coats of the arteries, where they replace the plexuses, as the 

 ganglion of the anterior communicating artery of the brain, 

 that of the cavernous sinus, that of the deep seated temporal 

 artery, &c. 



All these ganglions have in general an irregular and variable 

 figure; they have in general connexions with several nervous 

 trunks or branches. The direction of the medullary filaments 

 which traverse them is very complicated, and rarely thin fila- 



