Its Composite and Dissoluble Nature. 159 



These cells are collocated in a layer at a depth of less 

 than a millimeter in the outer stratum of the foliated cere- 

 bellar surface, and are nourished from a rich capillary- 

 plexus. They are supported, that is to say, held up 

 otherwise than by their own consistency and firmness, by 

 a system of adjuvant cells called neuroglia and formerly 

 known as "spider cells," or "basket cells," which some 

 observers have been inclined to classify as semi-nerve 

 cells. In some tracts of the brain these spider or basket 

 cells have been discerned as forming a net of supporting 

 fibers about the body of the larger nerve cell. 



From what may be designated as the base of the nerve 

 cell, there emerges a process, or protoplasmic branch, 

 termed the "axis-cylinder process," which dips downward 

 into a layer of smaller nuclear cells and enters the great 

 skein of nerve fibers which forms the .central parts of the 

 brain. How far this axis-cylinder process or fiber pro- 

 ceeds has never yet been fully demonstrated, but it is 

 believed to proceed to, or become continuous with a fiber 

 which does proceed to, other tracts of the opposite hemis- 

 phere of the brain, and even to pass down the spinal cord 

 and extend to distant tissues of the body. 



Reverting again to the body of the cell, we find issuing 

 from, the other side, the side opposite the base and hence 

 the part directed toward the outer surface, one and fre- 

 quently two large branching processes, which often extend 

 a relatively great distance toward the extreme outer sur- 



