MULLENIX: EIGHTH CRANIAL NERVE. P17 
related to the nerve fibres only by way of contact. ‘There were still 
those, however, who adhered to the older view, among whom were 
Kaiser (91), Niemak (’92), Ayers (’93), and Krause (’96). Ayers even 
went so far as to maintain that the fibres of the eighth nerve originate 
in the sense cells, as is the case with the fibres of the first nerve. 
Held (:02) investigated the conditions in mammals, and came to the 
conclusion that the sense cells are completely covered on their surface 
with a richly nervous neuritoplasm, which takes its origin in an 
intraepithelial branching of unmedullated fibres. ‘The axoplasm is 
represented by him as showing a netlike structure, and as intimately 
grown together with the protoplasm of the sense cell. 
In 1904 Ramén y Cajal (:04#, :04°) published a method of silver 
impregnation of nervous tissue which depended upon the reducing 
action of hydrochinon or of pyrogallic acid. Later in the same year 
(:04>) he published the results of the application of this method to 
various nervous organs. His treatment of peripheral conditions was 
meagre, but a small amount of space was devoted to an account of the 
conditions found in the ear of chick embryos seventeen to nineteen 
days old. His findings were in accord, in the main, with the contact 
views of Retzius and others. He described two types of nerve fibres: 
first, giant fibres, which make their way to the summit of the cristae 
and expand at their ends to form a structure which is evidently identical 
with the ‘“Kelchbildung” previously described by Retzius. ‘These 
Ramén y Cajal regarded as separable from the sense cells with a good 
degree of clearness; and, secondly, fine fibres, which pass chiefly to 
the margin of the sensory area and end free between the peripheral 
ends of the cells. 
Kolmer (:04) applied Ramén y Cajal’s method to the investigation 
of the conditions in the ear of the frog, and obtained results not incon- 
sistent with the contact theory. He described the sense cells as en- 
closed at their bases by an oval meshwork of fibrils, and, in some 
cases, as being surrounded at their bases or near their tops by loops 
of neurofibrillae. In a later paper Kolmer (:057) stated that upon 
further study, and by the close comparison of serial sections, he had 
concluded that the loop-shaped structure previously described was a 
part of a very complex pericellular network of neurofibrillae, which, 
however, was rarely differentiated by the method employed. He also 
maintained that neurofibrillae penetrate the sides of the sense cells 
and form intracellular networks, which, likewise, are seldom impreg- 
nated. He concluded that the fibrillae of the eighth and other sensory 
nerves have no real terminations, but turn back to the fibrillae of the 
