NATURE OF THE DRACUNCULUS, OR GUINEAWORM. 115 
arrangement into distinct glands must, in recent specimens, prevail in the lateral spaces 
as well as over the muscles. 
These processes are doubtless, as suggested by Busk, analogous to the “ appendices 
nourriciers" of Cloquet, described by him in Ascaris lumbricoides and also existing in 
Strongylus gigas. In the Guineaworm, as in Ascaris, they are more especially developed 
over the surface of the muscles, though those of Ascaris differ in the fact that they are 
much more regular in form, and also that the largest processes are situated in the 
median line of the dorsal and ventral regions, whilst the reverse obtains in Filaria 
medinensis. In intimate structure, too, the processes in Ascaris are not so firm and 
solid, and contain distinct areole as well as granules in their interior, whilst neither in 
the fresh nor preserved specimens examined have I been able to detect the central 
nucleated cell, which is constant in the Guineaworm. 
This extensive glandular system, existing in the simplest and most elementary form, 
is perhaps concerned with the absorption and elaboration of the nutritive fluid or blood 
contained in the general cavity of the body, and with which it is brought into contact 
throughout its whole extent. 
Besides this system of glands, I may perhaps mention in this place the collection of fat- 
cells to be presently described as surrounding the alimentary canal. These, Mr. Carter 
believes, have an hepatic function ; and if so, they would also be subsidiary to the absorp- 
tion and elaboration of fluids contained in the intestine, and thus be intimately connected 
in function with the extensive glandular system just described. 
Organs of Digestion.—The alimentary canal consists of a very narrow «esophagus and 
a wider intestine presenting no distinct stomachal dilatation, and throughout its whole 
extent enclosed in a loose peritoneal sheath, on which distinctly flattened epithelial 
cells can be recognized. The cesophageal portion is also lined with a distinct layer of 
muscular tissue. In its course through the body the intestine is for the most part 
unattached to the parietes, and winds several times round the genital tube before 
terminating, about th of an inch from the posterior extremity, in the concavity of 
the tail. 
The cesophagus is from one and a half to two inches in length, and very narrow; 
having an average diameter of about şğgth of an inch, though it varies somewhat in 
different parts of its course. Its walls are comparatively very thick, and appe to be 
muscular—the central canal being only 3gppth of an inch wide, though very likely this is 
narrowed by the action of the spirits of wine. 
This narrow cesophagus is contained in a much broader musculo-peritoneal pr. 
(PL XXII. figs. 31 & 33 1), together with a consistent mass of white granular matter*. 
For about one-sixth of an inch behind the oral aperture the sheath is attached to the 
parietes of the body by four strong, crucial, mesenteric processes gomg to the mier- 
muscular spaces, from the angles of the sheath, which in this situation 1s quadrilateral 
(PI. XXI. fig. 13 b. d, d, d, d) instead of being more or less rounded as in the remaining 
* This fine granular matter is precisely similar in appearance to that met with in the general cavity of the body ; 
50 that I am disposed to regard it merely as the remains of a fluid containing a large quantity of organie matter in 
Solution, 
