374 



MORBID ANATOMY OF THE SKIN. 



tons islets of the tumour (fig. 117). These fissures, which con- 

 tain the dropsical fluid, increase in size ; soon we come to speak 

 of bands of connective tissue stretched between the vessels ; and 

 when the fibroid development is complete, the entire mass is 

 represented by a network of thick trabeculae of connective tissue, 

 whose meshes are bridged over by thinner fasciculi of fibres 

 (fig. 117). It is self-evident that this structure must be quite as 

 soft, nay, softer than ordinar}^ granulation-tissue. If therefore 



Fig. 117. 



IS/, 



^%^Sv' 



Fibroma moUuscum. 1. Mature (after VircJiow) ; 2. Immature. 

 Formation of clefts in the islets of parenchyma, -s-^y. At 

 a. the lumen of a vessel- 



the word ^'molluscum" be derived from "mollis" (and this 

 hardly admits of doubt), no fitter name could possibly be found; 

 inasmuch as softness is, throughout the entire life of these 

 tumours, their chief characteristic. 



2. Diseases of the Corium and Subcutaneous 

 Aeeolau Tissue. 



§ 317. The position of the corium in pathological histology 

 is actually determined by the important circumstance that it 

 constitutes the greatest continuous accumulation of vascular 

 connective tissue in the body. A priori therefore, we should 

 expect to meet, not so muck with a series of novel and peculiar 

 appearances, as with a very clear, I might almost say, typical 

 evolution of the familiar histological potentialities of the inter- 



