RUPTURE AND DECOMPOSITION OF THE’STOMACH. 613 
tion. The first is the frame-work of the viscus, the other the 
accumulation of vessels — the minute glands — in which the work 
of secretion is performed. This is the granulation of the liver, 
evident enough when it is forcibly ruptured. The union of the 
two constitutes the lobules or divisions of this viscus. 
The vascular apparatus may be increased or diminished in 
bulk. It may distend these areolee, or but partially fill them. 
Its bulk is augmented in inflammation, and it constitutes hyper- 
trophy or enlargement of the liver ; it diminishes in, or its dimi- 
nution is the cause of, atrophy of that viscus. It sometimes 
almost disappears. We must have been careless observers, if, in 
examining the dead, we have not occasionally found a larger or 
smaller portion of the liver in a manner destitute of the vascular 
tissue, and presenting that only which is, "properly [speaking, 
cellular ; and we certainly have perceived how much more dis- 
tinct the granules are in some cases than in others. Now if, 
under the almost slightest degree of fever or general inflamma- 
tion, there is some process of decomposition going forward every 
where, accompanied by the extrication of gas, the passage of 
which among the cells beneath the skin is the cause of the 
crackling which we hear on pressing the hand on the loins of a 
bullock — if it is one of the circumstances by which we judge of 
the degree of fever, and consequently of danger — -if, as Mr. 
Richardson very properly observes, it is heard in some cases of 
puncture in the horse, — it can readily be supposed that emphysema 
of the liver is not an impossible state of that viscus, discharging 
so important a function — so susceptible of disease, and often so 
cruelly taxed ; but the gossamer texture of the areolae will not 
permit it to exist to any great extent, or even to be’ detected 
when it does really exist. 
We ought, perhaps, to apologize for this^'note; and will con- 
clude by thanking Mr. Richardson for permitting us to record 
this rare and valuable case. 
Y. 
RUPTURE AND DECOMPOSITION OF THE 
STOMACH. 
By Mr . Hayes, Rochdale . 
An aged coach horse, the property of Mrs. Marriatt, who 
keeps a coach establishment at this place, had been affected three 
or four times, at short intervals, with what the grooms con- 
sidered as gripes, and which, with a little simple treatment, had 
VOL. x. 4 k 
