Wyman on the Cancelli of Bones. 199 
measured, or of 60° if the upper. The weight of the body 
will, therefore, have an angular bearing upon the axis of the 
neck, and its tendency will be to bend or break the neck in a 
downward direction. ‘The means which nature has adopted 
to counteract this tendency, consist : — 
1. In making the vertical diameter of the neck the largest, 
a section at right angles to its axis being oval, and the long 
diameter perpendicular. 
2. In increasing the thickness of the wall of bone on the 
under side of the neck and adjoining portion of the shaft, on 
to which a large portion of the weight of the body is directly 
transmitted. 
3. In having the cancelli of each femur so arranged as to 
form a segment of a framed arch or truss, which coóperates 
with the external shell in sustaining the weight of the body ; 
the necks of the two femora forming together opposite seg- 
ments of an arch. 
The first and second of these conditions has been frequently 
adverted to by anatomical writers, but the third has almost 
invariably escaped observation. 
. . Sir Charles Bell, whose views of the animal mechanism are 
generally so beautiful and true, has not manifested his usual 
accuracy in his description of the structure of the neck of the 
1 Thi 3 ft m the 
imen which has served for the present 
deseri É t confusio on exists in systematic treatiaeli, with iecit 
the angle which ^ neck makes with the shaft of the femur. Some wri 
it only in general terms, as €— who refers to it as “un angle bison droit; ” 
i angle aigu iiri mc Quain, as *an obtuse angle," 
Wh ise stat difference will be found, not only as 
regards the number of degiees which the angle is estimated to make, but, also, with 
ngl easuring angle which the axis of 
the neck makes with that of the shaft shaft below their union, and others with the continu- 
ation of that axis above it. In order, therefore, to compare the different statements, it 
will be necessary to give, in each case, the complementary angles, an d then we can 
designate the corresponding angles. The angle which the neck makes with the shaft, 
is, according to 
— B. Cooper, 
“Sempre arent gr we hve 127, 135, 140°, E UP iri i 
variation of 20°. 
JOURNAL B. S. N. H. 17 JAN, 1, 1850. 
“ao” — " 55°. 
ee: poa 
