212 SPECIAL HISTOLOGY. 



itself we know that it is often quite solid, at other times fluid, puriform, 

 and pale colored. In the latter case, which is seen in congested condi- 

 tions of the external meatus, it contains far more fluid and free fat than 

 usual, and very beautiful cells containing fat.* With regard to the 

 mode of examining the ceruminous glands, I must refer to the sudori- 

 parous glands, with which they wholly agree in position, chemical rela- 

 tion to acids, alkalies, &c. &c. 



Literature. R. Wagner, " Icones Phys.," tab. xvi. fig. 11, A, B ; 

 Krause and Kohlrausch, in Muller's " Archiv," 1839, p. cxvi. ; Pappen- 

 heim, " Beitrage zur Kentniss der Structur des gesunden Ohres," in 

 Eroriep's "Neue Notizen," 1838, No. 141, p. 131, and Specielle Gebe- 

 lehre d. Gehororgans (Breslau, 1840); Henle, "Allg. Anat." pp. 915, 

 916, 934, 941 ; Huschke "Eingeweidelehre," p. 819; Hassall, "Microsc. 

 Anatomy," &c., p. 427, pi. Ivii. ; Valentin, article " Gewebe," in Wagner's 

 "Handw. d. Phys.," i. p. 755. 



C. OF THE SEBACEOUS GLANDS. 



73. The Sebaceous Glands are small whitish glands, which exist in 

 almost every part of the skin, and which afford the cutaneous sebaceous 

 or fatty secretion. 



In form they vary very considerably ; the simplest (Fig. 84, A) are 

 short follicles of an elongated or pyriform shape ; in others the simple 

 racemose glands two, three, or even more follicles or vesicles are 

 united with a shorter or longer peduncle ; whilst in others, lastly (Figs. 

 84 Bj 85), two, three, or more simple clusters of follicles communicate 

 with a common duct, constituting an elegant compound racemose gland. 

 Besides these three forms, which represent only the chief varieties, there 

 are a good many intermediate ones, which do not require any detailed 

 description. 



The sebaceous glands occur principally in the hairy parts of the body, 

 opening, in common with the hair-sacs, upon the surface, whence they 

 have also been termed the glands of the hair-sacs. 



In all the coarser hairs, the glands appear to be lateral appendages 

 of the hair-sacs, and open by narrow excretory ducts into them (Figs. 



* [There is an occasional ingredient in the so-called cerumen which is worthy of notice, 

 viz. a mucedinous fungus. Attention has been recently called to its occurrence by Dr. 

 Inman (" Quarterly Journal of Micros. Science," January, 1853), who states that a pellet of 

 ear-wax which he examined was composed of nothing but this fungus, with a minute por- 

 tion of epithelium. However, Professor Mayer, of Bonn, so long ago as 1844 ("Beobach- 

 tung Von Cysten mit Fadenpilzen aus dem aussern Gehb'rgange," &c., Muller's "Archiv," 

 1844, p. 404), described at length the structure of certain sacs containing fungi, which were 

 extracted from the external auditory meatus of a girl eight years old, in whom they appear 

 to have been at first accompanied by considerable deafness and irritation. The sacs were 

 as large as a pea, and open atone end 5 externally they were composed of layers of epithe- 

 lium scales, from which mucedinous threads, terminated by globular sporangia, projected into 

 the cavity of the sac. These sacs appear to have been repeatedly formed and discharged, 

 to a very considerable number. Tns J 



