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III. — On the Ossification Process in Birds, and the New Formation 
of Bed Blood-corpuscles during the Ossification Process* 
By Dr. L. Schoney. 
Plates CXLVI., CXLYII., and CXLVIII. 
Contrary to the assertion of Yirchow, Heinrich Miiller, and other 
more recent investigators, that marrow tissue proceeds direct from 
cartilage, other views have recently been published, according to 
which the elements of the marrow are said to have immigrated 
either from the blood-vessels or the periosteum. In the same 
manner remained the question up to this day debatable, in which 
way the bones originate, notwithstanding the pioneering researches 
of Heinrich Miiller. I thought it therefore desirable to study this 
question on such objects which, as far as I know, have not been 
yet examined, viz. cartilage and bone of hirds. 
The following statements refer to a number of fowl and 
pigeons of various ages. Immediately after death of the animals, 
I put the exarticulated legs, which were quickly freed from the 
muscles, into some yellow solution of chromic acid, to which I added 
a few drops of muriatic acid. A few days afterwards I prepared 
EXPLANATION OF PLATES CXLVL, CXLVIL, AND CXLVIIL 
Fig. 1. — Vertical section through the joint cartilage of a young fowl x 250. 
a. Zone of flat spindle-shaped cartilage corpuscles immediately at the knee-joint 
surface, b. Zone of the round nuclei-holding cartilage corpuscles, with blood- 
vessel enclosing marrow-spaces c. d. Yellowish-red zone of small thickly-crowded 
flat cartilage corpuscles, e. Zone of the lime-deposited elementary substance of 
the cartilage, up to which reach the ready-formed bone spicules /. Between these 
are the first-formed marrow-spaces of the bone g. 
Fig. 2, — Vertical section of the same x 450, marked as Fig, 1. In the marrow- 
spaces of the bone variously shaped marrow elements, and between these multi- 
nuclear protoplasm bodies. 
Fig. 3. — Horizontal section through the knee-joint cartilage of a young fowl, 
close to the ossification border x 450. e. Lime structure of the cartilage, which 
appears interrupted by interspersed solution spaces of the cartilage elementary 
substance k k. 
Fig. 4. — Portion of the same preparation x 700. To the cartilage, which con- 
tains a certain amovmt of lime structure, is attached a zone a, in which the lime 
salts are dissolved. Rigidly bordered by this zone is visible a new-formed marrow- 
space b. In the protoplasm of the latter are interspersed homogeneous lustrous 
small particles of various forms. 
Fig. 5. — Segment of a little bone spicule engaged in formation x 700. 
a. Cartilage with grate-like lime structure, b. Cartilage with hyaline elementary 
substance, c. Zone of the new-formed earliest bone, with interspersed star-like 
bone-corpuscles, d. Zone of the osteoblasts, engaged in transition into true bony 
substance. 
Fig. 6. — Oblique section through the ossification border of the bone of a young 
fowl X 700. The marrow-space a is surrounded by hyaline cartilage with lime 
structure. In the marrow-space are visible various nuclei with pointed ends, in 
the interior of which lie homogeneous lustrous small particles, hamatoblastse. 
In the lowest vascular space the red blood-corpuscles are still without nuclei. 
* Translated from Schultze's ' Archiv ' by W. R. 
