396 ANATOMICAL AND PATHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 



The trunks of two lacteals could be easily traced up the 

 centre of the villus, and as they approached the vesicular mass 

 they subdivided and looped. In no instance could one of 

 these lacteals be traced to any of the spherical vesicles, nor 

 could any direct communication between the structures be 

 detected.* The bloodvessels and capillaries, with their 

 columns of tawny blood disks, could be seen passing in 

 radiating lines and in loops across the villus, immediately 

 under the fine membrane already mentioned. This membrane, 

 perceptible on the body and neck of the villus only by the 

 smooth surface it presented, was most distinctly traced at the 

 free extremity of the villus, as it passed from the surface 

 of one vesicle on to that of another.t The vesicles, pushing 

 the membrane forward, and grouped together in masses on its 

 attached surface, gave the extremity of the villus the appear- 

 ance of a mulberry. When viewed on a dark ground as an 

 opaque object, the point directed to the light, a villus in 

 this condition is remarkably beautiful, the play of the light 

 on the surface of the highly-refractive semi-opaque and 

 opalescent vesicles giving them the appearance of a group of 

 pearls. 



In villi turgid with chyle, which have been kept for some 

 time in spirits, the contents of the vesicles are opaque, the 

 albumen having become coagulated. 



To understand the part which the vesicles of the villus 

 play in digestion, it is necessary to be aware of certain of the 

 functions of the cell, with which physiologists are yet un- 

 acquainted. Not only are these bodies the germs of all the 

 tissues, as determined by the labours of Schleiden and 

 Schwann, but are also the immediate agents of secretion. A 



* See Gulliver's translation of Gerber's General Anatomy, pp. 272 and 273. 



+ Mr. Bowman, in the article "Mucous Membrane," Cyclopaedia of Ana- 

 tomy, does not admit this portion of the membrane. It certainly cannot be 

 detached as a separate membrane. 



