PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 53/ 



now find that they are not globules but rimples. For on examining beef mus- 

 cles, I found them to be made up of small strings lying close joined together 

 one by another ; which were so small that 50 of them, laid one by another, would 

 not make the breadth of the 22d part of an inch, and if supposed a 20th, 

 leaving 2 for the thickness of the membrane that incloses them, there will be 

 found 1000 of such strings lying one by another to make the breadth of an 

 inch, and consequently 1,000,000 of them in a square inch. 



In some of my late observations I took notice, that about 100 of these mus- 

 cular strings lying by each other were wrapped round, and inclosed with a mem- 

 brane, which made a muscular chord. At another time I observed in the 

 muscles of an ox's tongue 3 such muscular chords, each enwrapped with its 

 distinct membrane, whose ends when cut across would be covered by a sand no 

 larger than the 100th part of an inch; whence we may conceive there may be 

 about 5000 of such muscular chords in a square inch. 



I have compared also the magnitude of these muscular strings with the size 

 of the hair of my peruke and of my beard, and I conceived that about 4 of 

 these muscular strings of the diaphragm of an ox, near the ribs, would make, 

 but the thickness of a hair of my peruke, and g were only sufficient to equal 

 the hair of my beard. Now we must not suppose that these muscular strings 

 are round, but each has its particular form from the pressing of them close to- 

 gether. 



In my last observations I examined the muscles of a hare, and therein I saw 

 very clearly and neatly, that divers of these muscular strings ended very sharp 

 in the membranes of the muscle, divers also that ended in the tendons. These 

 observations I made with a very good microscope. These observations caused 

 me again to renew my examinations of the muscular strings of fish, to find out 

 their contexture ; hereupon I viewed several parts of cod-fishes, and found that 

 the thickest of these muscular strings were to be found in the parts under the 

 belly, which vve here call wangen. Here I found also that the strings of the 

 membranes being separated were furnished with rings or rimples, after the same 

 manner as I had obser\^ed the muscular strings of flesh to be. I further also 

 took notice, that when I had cut the strings athwart, I could very clearly dis- 

 cover the ends of a verj^ great number of small filaments, of which I conceived 

 every muscular string of fish was composed. 



Now from the knowledge of the number of filaments in the circumference, 

 it will not be difficult to compute how great a number of such filaments there 

 may be in the body of such a muscular string of fish; for, following the rule 

 of Archimedes, we shall find that there may be almost 3200 of such filaments 

 contained in every such string. Now who can in his thoughts comprehend 



VOL. II. 3 Z 



