TERMINATION OF NERVES OF MAMMALIAN CORNEA. 471 
break up into a network, which is of exceeding minute- 
ness. The network appears composed of small rods of equal 
length, and at all the nodal points there is a minute dot or 
granule. These rods appear generally faintly stained as 
compared with the dots, but in some places they are stained 
as much as the latter. Only in few places have I seen this 
network very perfect, and then only over a small space, but 
then it appeared with sufficiently great distinctness as a 
reticulated plate-like expansion of some of the fine nerve- 
fibrils. This minute network, which I shall call the ter- 
minal nettoorh, is shown in figs. 11, 14, 15, 16, and I must 
refer the reader to these figures which give a more compre- 
hensive idea of its nature than any lengthy description ; 
it is situated hetioeen the epithelial cells, since we see 
it from its broad surface and in profile (see figs. 1 1 and 16). 
As mentioned on a previous page, fibrils with end-knobs are 
met w'ith in almost all layers, and so, I presume, is also 
the terminal network, but for obvious reasons it is only 
distinctly traceable in the superficial layer. 
In the above figures I have, for the sake of comparison, 
added a few nuclei of the flattened epithelial cells ; these 
nuclei are just visible as faintly outlined oval or spherical 
discs, of a pale grey or bluish colour ; of the outlines of the 
cells themselves nothing can be seen. 
Thus, it is easily recognised that the nerve-fibrils we have to 
deal with here as connected with the end reticulum are con- 
siderably finer than those drawn by Hoyer (fig. 2, pi. xiii), or 
Izquierdo (b c., fig. 5, pi. i). The fineness of the terminal net- 
-vvork is by no means inferior to that of the terminal network 
which I described of the nerves in the skin of the ttadpole, 
and situated immediately underneath the epithelium Sit- 
zungsber. d. k. Akadem. der Wiss.,^ Vienna, 1870, vol. 61), 
and also observed by Lavdowsky Arch. f. norm, und path. 
Histolog.,^ 1870, and ^ Centralblatt f. med. Wiss.,’ 1872, 
No. 17), nor that discovered by Gerlach in the grey matter 
of the spinal cord (^ Centralblatt f. d. medizin. Wiss.,’ 1867, 
Nos. 24 and 25), and by Rindfleisch (^Archiv f. mikr. Anat.,’ 
viii, p. 453) and Gerlach (‘ Centralbl. f. d. medizin. 
Wiss.,’ 1872, No. 18), in the grey matter of the cortex 
of the cerebrum. If Waldeyer in his last article (Vlrchiv. 
f. mikr. Anatomie,’ xvii Band, iii Heft) sums up by say- 
ing (p. 379) that there exist no terminal networks, and that 
the fine nerve-fibres ending in the epithelium, either run out 
freely or end with a minute knob, it is necessary to remind 
the reader that Waldeyer bases himself on Izquierdo’s speci- 
mens, which, as far as refers to the intraepithelial nerve • 
