FATTY DEGENEEATION. 21 



must therefore be taken to denote a spherical aggregation of oil 

 globules, held together by an albuminoid basis. 



The presence of a large number of these granule-cells gives 

 the fluid in which they are suspended, or the tissue in whose 

 interstices they lie, a yellowish-white or butter-yellow tint. 

 Thus the colostrum, i.e. the milk which 

 is secreted during the first few days 

 after confinement, is not white, but 

 yellowish and glutinous ; it separates 

 on standing into a clear serous portion, 

 and a creamy fluid which rises to the 

 surface. The latter is almost entirely p^^ty metamorphosis, 

 made up of granule-cells, which owe Epithelium of pericar- 



their origin to a fatty degeneration ^^^^. ^9^ % ^^^^ of 

 ^ . T ,. ^ ettusion mto its sac. a. 



ot the glandular epithelia, and are Cells which still exhibit 

 called colostrum corpuscles. In like their normal form and 

 ., r. 1 X 1- • arrangement: first ap- 



manner (to confine ourselves to physio- pearance of oil globules; 

 logical examples) the corpora lutea of ^- Granule cells, one of 

 the ovary owe their name to a fatty ^enW ^'toTe™'' I 

 degeneration of the cells of the mem- Granule cells breaking 

 brana granulosa, which takes place in ^P ^^^^ ^ily debris. 

 all Graafian follicles which have expelled their contents and 

 are undergoing retrograde metamorphosis. 



§ 28. The last stage of fatty degeneration may be appro- 

 priately called ^' emulsification." The granule cells break up, 

 owing to the solution of their albuminoid cement in the sur- 

 rounding fluid, w^hich always has an alkaline reaction. A lively 

 oscillation of the oil globules (molecular movement of Bvoimi) 

 announces their imminent disintegration ; the outermost globules 

 next become detached from the circumference of the cell, and 

 are uniformly distributed through the surrounding fluid, while 

 the residual aggregate undergoes progressive diminution, until 

 at length it disappears, without leaving a trace behind. (This 

 succession of phenomena may be admirably seen in the cells of 

 cancer juice.) The fluid emulsion in which the oil globules are 



characteristic of inflammation. They were afterwards shown to be 

 nothing more than the epithelial cells of the lungs in a state of fatty 

 degeneration, freed from their attachments by the oedema which pre- 

 cedes the inflammation, and so destroyed. 



