1870.] Zoology. 141 



gas in protoplasm as a physiological phenomenon ; in the second 

 place, for the supposed voluntary nature of this development, of 

 which this exceedingly simple organism makes use for the purpose 

 of locomotion. In the c Cambridge Journal of Anatomy ' this paper 

 is noticed very fully by Dr. Moore. 



Starch in Muscles. — Nasse has found starch in the muscles, of 

 which he considers it a normal constituent, and believes it to be 

 consumed in muscular action, forming a part of the fuel with which 

 our muscular engines are fed. It is not many years since starch 

 was regarded as a peculiarly vegetable product, and even now it 

 seems difficult to persuade some people that it is not. Bernard's 

 discovery of glycogen, or liver-starch, is, however, sufficiently well 

 known, and so-called " annyloid substance " has been found in many 

 other organs. The starch in muscle is probably connected with 

 the sugar there found, and some time since shown to be connected 

 with muscular activity by Kanke. 



The Endings of Nerves in the Liver. — Professor Pfliiger, of 

 Bonn, continues his valuable researches on the terminations of 

 nerves in the various glands of the body. By the use of hyperos- 

 mic acid applied in a method peculiar to himself, Pfliiger has shown 

 that the nerves to the salivary and pancreatic glands end in or as 

 parts of the substance of the secreting cells of those glands. He 

 now shows, in the last" number of his ' Archiv,' that this method of 

 termination is found also in the liver. His observations on the 

 structure of the liver generally are confirmatory of Dr. Beale's 

 views, in opposition to some recent German investigators. He 

 speaks of the hepatic cell as a nucleated swelling of the axis cylin- 

 der of a nerve. Hence the influence of the nervous system on the 

 secretion of bile, as seen in the well-known influence of mental 

 affections upon it, is rendered intelligible. So, too, with regard to 

 other glands, for Pfliiger holds that it is impossible to understand 

 the action of a nerve upon a secreting gland, or upon any other 

 active structure, without the supposition of a continuity of struc- 

 ture between the two, and this continuity he has now demonstrated 

 in the more important glands. 



The Secretory Nerve of the Parotid Gland. — Professor Eck- 

 hard has, in a recently published essay, given an account of a 

 series of careful researches on the nerves which directly stimulate 

 the secretion of the parotid gland. By various arguments he is led 

 finally to the conclusion, that in dogs the secretory nerve of the 

 parotid is the tympanic branch of the glosso-pharyngeal nerve. 



