48 



THE EXTEENAL AND MIDDLE EAE, BY J. KESSEL. 



vessels, as well as in the interstices between the capillaries. 

 If we inspect such a plexus more minutely, we see that the 

 several fibres are closely adherent to the capillaries, but 

 occasionally run at some distance from them, so that a small 

 clear space becomes apparent between the margins of the 

 nerve and vessel. In its further course the nerve may leave 

 the vessel altogether and join with the plexus found beneath 

 the rete Malpighii, or it may break up at once into very fine 

 fibres which encircle the capillaries. 



Lipmann* and Tomsaf have given a similar account, but, like myself, 

 have been unable to trace any connection between the nerve fibrils 

 and the nuclei of the capillary wall. 



Fig. 284. 



Fig. 284. Nucleated nerve fibre which is attached to the capillary 

 wall at d, by a pyriform enlargement. From a specimen taken from 

 Man, and prepared with chloride of gold. 



A second kind of nerve fibres do not present the above 

 detailed characters, but appear as simple axis-cylinders which 

 are enlarged at many points of their course into nodal swell- 



* Inavg. Dissert. Berlin, 1869. 



t CentralUatt fur die medecin. Wissenschaften, No. 39. 



