538 MANUAL OF PHYSIOLOGY. 



5. Pacinian corpuscles. They are ovoid bodies made up of a 

 great number of concentrically arranged layers of material, of 

 varying consistence, with a collection of fluid in the centre in 

 which an axis cylinder ends. There is no doubt that they are the 

 terminals of afferent nerves, but if they belong to the sense of touch, 

 which is doubtful, it is unknown to what special form of sensation 

 they are devoted. From their comparatively remote relation to 



FIG. 211. 



Drawing of termination of nerves on the surface of the rabbit's cornea. 

 a, Nerve fibre of sub-epithelial network ; b, Fine fibres entering epithelium ; 

 c, Intra-epithelial network. (Klein.) 



the skin, lying some distance beneath it and not in it, as are the 

 other endings mentioned they are probably connected with the 

 appreciation of pressure sensations rather than those more properly 

 called tactile. 



The sense of touch must be carefully distinguished from ordi- 

 nary sensibility or the capability of feeling pain, which is not a 

 special but a general sensation, and is received and transmitted by 

 different nerve channels. This we know from the facts, that the 

 mucous passages in general can receive and transmit painful but 



