FORMATION OF ATHEROMA IN ARTERIES. 



If now, gentlemen, we trace the development of the 

 atheromatous condition a little further back, we come- 

 anteriorly to the period when the pultaceous matter is 

 found in the seat of the atheroma across a stage, 

 where nothing more is found than fatty degeneration in 

 its ordinary form of granule-cells, and we distinctly con- 

 vince ourselves, that the process in this stage absolutely 

 differs in no respect from that which in the case of the 

 heart and kidney we have just declared to constitute the 

 stage of fatty metamorphosis. At this period, imme- 

 diately before the formation of the dep6t, the state of 

 matters, as seen with a high power, is about as follows. 

 On making a section we see the fatty cells which are 

 interspersed through the tissue becoming larger towards 

 the middle and lying more closely together, but gene- 



FIG. 118. 



rally bearing the form of cells ; but, as we proceed 

 from within outwards they become smaller and less 

 numerous. All these cells are filled with small, fatty 

 granules which strongly reflect the light. Hereby is 

 produced what looks to the eye in a section like a whitish 

 spot. Between these fatty corpuscles runs a meshed 



Fig. 118. Vertical section from a sclerotic plate in the aorta (internal coat, inner 

 surface) in process of fatty degeneration ; t, the innermost part of the coat with 

 round nuclei, isolated, and in groups of several (divided), k. The layer of en- 

 larging cells ; networks are seen with spindle-shaped cells which enclose sections 

 of cells resembling those of cartilage, p. Proliferating layer; division of the 

 nuclei and cells, a, a'. The layer which is becoming atheromatous ; a, the com- 

 mencement of the process, a', the advanced stage of fatty degeneration. 300 

 diameters. 



