ON THE HUMAN BRAIN. 
229 
and physiology of’ the nervous system, and more especially, and 
wisely too, as it regards the connexion of this system with health 
and disease. In this work he presents his class, and the medi- 
cal public generally, with the result of his observations on one 
portion of the system, — the brain, and to that he strictly confines 
himself. His description of that organ and its functions is so 
simple, and luminous, and satisfactory, that we lament that he 
had not extended his views to the whole circle of nervous power 
and influence; consoling ourselves, however, with the persuasion 
that the favourable regard which this fasciculus will receive, 
will stimulate him to complete the all-important subject on which 
he has entered. 
But what has the veterinary student to do with the human 
brain ? Certainly nothing at all in the estimation of him who 
has absurdly confined his inquiries to one animal only, and 
who dares not to look beyond that one, lest his strange assump- 
tions and wild theories should be scattered before the wind ; but 
much with the student who is preparing to practise on the dis- 
eases of animals belonging to various classes, and who therefore 
feels that he must obtain a competent idea of the manner in which 
the important organs of each are adapted to the destiny they are 
to fulfil, and who, in the cerebral structure of the chief of this 
inferior world, would expect to find the noblest work of the 
Creator. 
But Mr. Solly connects the inquiries of the two classes of 
students in a way that is interesting and flattering to us. “The 
study of the human brain could not be introduced to the pupil 
in a more philosophical manner, or with a prospect of greater 
advantage to him, than by taking an extended but general view 
of the nervous system of the lower orders of animals. “ I use 
comparative anatomy,” says he, “ as an ally in my attempt to 
simplify the study of the human brain, without regarding it, as it 
really is, an object of extreme interest, and capable of rendering- 
essential service to the student in medicine.” If, then, the medi- 
cal man, who can have but one patient — his fellow biped — seeks 
and values these auxiliary studies, surely they must be more 
important to us, whose practice is, or ought to be, a course of 
comparative physiology and pathology. 
Our author supposes the brain to consist of an accumulation 
of small swellings or nodules — of neurine — ganglia ; of cords or 
commissures which connect these ganglia together ; and of other 
cords — nerves — by which these ganglia are connected with the 
tissues of the different organs. The peculiar power of the ner- 
vous system resides in the cineritious or ganglial portion of the 
brain, and the office of the medullary portion is simply that of 
