CHAPTER XXXII. 



THE SYMPATHETIC SYSTEM OF NERVES, 

 BY DR. SIGMUND MAYER. 



THE so-called sympathetic or vegetative nervous system is 

 widely distributed throughout the animal body, especially in 

 those organs in which the functions of reproduction and of 

 organic life are combined, and in that structure to which the 

 term of sympathetic cord or trunk has been applied. The 

 uniform and regular segmentation that occurs in the cerebro- 

 spinal system is less clearly marked in the sympathetic system, 

 the principal trunk with its successive ganglia alone exhibit- 

 ing a regular type. Elsewhere the cells and fibres of the 

 sympathetic are more or less irregularly distributed through 

 the body, supplying for the most part the complex systems of 

 the vegetative and generative organs. Whilst the cells of the 

 cerebro-spinal organs exert an influence through the agency of 

 the cerebral and spinal nerves on both transversely striated 

 and on smooth muscular fibres, the action of the nerve cells of 

 the sympathetic on striated muscle has only been demon- 

 strated in Mammals in the case of the heart. 



It was formerly much discussed whether the sympathetic 

 nervous system was an altogether independent formation, or 

 was an appendage of the cerebro-spinal system. It is now 

 recognized, however, that such a discussion is profitless ; for in 

 view of the free interchange of fibres between the sympathetic 

 and the cerebro-spinal system of nerves, it is obvious that 

 the most intimate connection exists between the two organs. 

 Both systems, morever, may be regarded as together con- 

 stituting an organization with the same functional attributes, 



