123 



CHAP. IX. 



THE FUNCTION OF THE ABSORBENT VESSELS. 



" THE course of the chyle b from the intestines to the blood 

 is through a part of the absorbent system." 



"This is divided into four parts lacteal and lymphatic vessels, 

 conglobate glands," (or ganglia, as they are now often termed,) 

 " and the thoracic duct. Each of these will be now considered. 



" The lacteals originate among the villi of the internal coat of 

 the intestines ;" but most writers have been unable to detect 

 their origin. Lieberkiihn and Cruikshank, however, appear to 

 have been successful. The former says, that each villus is a 

 lacteal with valves, swelling into a bulb or ampulla at its termin- 

 ation, on the summit of which is an orifice. The latter opened 

 a woman who had died suddenly of convulsions after taking a 

 hearty supper in perfect health. " Many of the villi," he says, 

 " were so full of chyle that I saw nothing of the ramifications 

 of the arteries and veins; the whole appeared as one white 

 vesicle, without any red lines, pores, or orifices whatever. Others 

 of the villi contained chyle, but in a small proportion; and 

 the ramifications of the veins were numerous, and prevailed 

 by their redness over the whiteness of the villi. In some hun- 

 dred villi I saw the trunk of a lacteal forming a beginning 

 by radiated branches. The orifices of these radii were very 

 distinct on the surface of the villus, as well as the radii them- 

 selves seen through the external surface, passing into the 

 trunk of the lacteal : they were full of a white fluid. There 

 was but one of these trunks on each villus. The orifices in 

 the villi of the jejunum, as Dr. Hunter himself said, (when I 

 asked him, as he viewed them in the microscope, how many he 



a " A very copious list of writers upon the absorbents will be found in Som- 

 merring's work, De morbis vasorum absorbentium corporis humani. Francof. 

 1795. 8vo." 



b " Ant. Muller, Experimenta circa ehylurn. Heidelb. 1819. 8vo." 



