THE SPLEEN. 



553 



Fig. 223. 



scles or vesicles, are white roundish bodies, which are imbedded in the red 

 substance of the spleen and are con- 

 nected with the smallest arteries. 

 They are constant only in quite 

 fresh and healthy subjects ; but 

 not at all, or rarely, in those who 

 die of disease, or after long fasting. 

 It hence becomes comprehensible 

 that Von Hessling found the cor- 

 puscles only 116 times in 960 

 examinations. In subjects whose 

 age was between the first and 

 second year, they were present in 

 every second individual ; from the 

 second to the tenth year, in every 

 third ; from the tenth to the four- 

 teenth, in every sixteenth ; and from 

 the fourteenth onwards, only in 

 every thirty-second. In the bodies 



of those who die suddenly, as in consequence of accidents, suicide, or 

 judicial sentence (of the latter of whom I have examined three cases), 

 they are probably never absent ; and it is the same with the majority of 

 children. In these cases they are as numerous and as distinct as in 

 Mammalia. The size of the splenic corpuscles is liable to certain varia- 

 tions in Man and in animals, and has hitherto, for the most part, been 

 over-estimated, in consequence of their having been incompletely isolated. 

 Their diameter is from 1-10-1-3, on the average 1-6 of a line ; and 

 very probably depends upon the varying condition of the chylopoietic 

 organs, so that the corpuscles are larger after food has been taken 

 than at other times ; though, in confirmation of Ecker's statement, I 

 can affirm that they are to be met with, beautifully developed, in fasting 

 animals also. We have no data of any kind with regard to this point 

 in Man. 



The Malpighian corpuscles, though imbedded in the red pulp and 

 hardly separable from it, are nevertheless always attached to a branch of 

 an artery, in such a manner that they either rest laterally immediately 

 upon a vessel, or are situated in its angle of division, or finally appear 

 stalked ; in which latter case, however, the stalk itself, again, is usually 

 a small artery. Their number is very considerable, arterial twigs of 

 0-02-0-04 of a line carrying 5-10 corpuscles, so that extracted with 

 them from the pulp, they present the figure of an elegent raceme (Fig. 

 228). It appears to me that it would be rather under, than over 



FIG. 228. A portion of a small artery, with a branch covered with Malpighian corpus- 

 cles (Dog), magnified 10 diameters. 



