69 
of nerves in the placenta. 
are quite white. When the nerves are very minutely exa- 
mined, each fibre appears to consist of a row of small glo- 
bules connected with one another. 
At the time the nerves in the placenta were discovered, 
Sir Stamford Raffles (whose misfortune in having lost 
the most valuable collection in Natural History ever made in 
the East Indies by the ship taking fire, every one must feel 
for) brought me from Sumatra the pregnant uterus of the 
tapir of that country ; and as in that animal the umbilical 
chord is connected with the chorion (there being no pla- 
centa), I examined the transparent portion of the chorion 
along which the branches of the funis pass, before they 
arrive at the spongy part, and there the nerves are so con- 
spicuous, that Mr. Bauer's representation of them of the natu- 
ral size is annexed. 
The principal object of the present Lecture is to esta- 
blish the fact of nerves existing in the placenta ; and in these 
animals in which there is no placenta, in the floculent cho- 
rion, which is substituted for it ; and it is a curious fact, that 
they should be largest in the latter. 
This discovery places the placentular circulation in a new 
point of view, since, from the known influence of the nerves 
on the blood vessels, it is reasonable to believe that, during 
I 
life, there are branches of communication between those of 
the uterus and foetus, although too minute to be explored in 
the dead body. The erection of the penis cannot be produced 
after death by injecting the arteries, although when the nerves 
are excited the smaller branches give a ready passage to the 
blood. Having traced nerves from the foetus to the maternal 
portion of the placenta, it will add to the value of this com- 
