1864] 



of Nerve-anrents in Nerve-cells. 



391 



enable me to modify them and render them more exact. The fibres would 

 in nature be infinitely longer than represented in the diagrams. The cell 

 below c (fig. 5) may be one of the caudate nerve-cells in the anterior root 

 of a spinal nerve, that above b one of the cells of the ganglion upon the 

 posterior root, and a the periphery. I will not attempt to describe the 

 course of these fibres until many different observations upon which 1 am 

 now engaged are further advanced, but I have already demonstrated the 

 passage of the fibres from the ganglion-cell into the dark-bordered fibres 

 as represented in the diagram. 



Fig. 5. 



c 



h 



Diagram to show possible relation of fibres from caudate nerve-ceUs, and fibres from 

 cells in ganglia, as, for example, the ganglia on the posterior roots, a is supposed to 

 be the periphery ; the cell above h one of those in the ganglion. The three caudate 

 cells resemble those in the grey matter of the cord, medulla oblongata, and brain. 



Tlie peculiar appearance I have demonstrated in the large caudate cells, 

 taken in connexion with the fact urged by me in several papers, that no 

 true termination or commencement has yet been demonstrated in the case 

 of any nerve, seems to me to favour the conclusion that the action of a 

 nervous apparatus results from varying intensities of continuous currents 

 which are constantly passing along the nerves during life, rather than from 

 the sudden interruption or completion of nerve-currents. So far from any 

 arrangement having been demonstrated in connexion with any nervous 

 structure which would perrnit the sudden interruption and completion of a 

 current, anatomical observation demonstrates the structural continuity of 

 all nerve-fibres with nerve-cells, and, indirectly through these cells, with 

 one another. 



