3<3 Mr. Abernethy on some Particulars 
this state great numbers of arteries and veins, but chiefly of 
the former vessels, are seen terminating on their inside, in the 
same indistinct manner as the foramina Thebesii appear when 
the cavities of the heart are laid open : the bristles also ren- 
der visible the termination of a certain number of lacteals. I 
examined the sides of these bags, which were moderately thick 
and firm ; but I did not see any thing which, from its appear- 
ance, I could call a muscular structure. 
From the circumstances that have been related, it appears, 
that in the whale there are two ways by which the chyle can 
pass from the intestines into the thoracic duct ; one of these is 
through those lacteals, which pour the absorbed chyle into 
bags, in which it receives an addition of animal fluids. The 
other passage for the chyle is through those lacteals which 
form a plexus on the inside of the bags ; through these ves- 
sels it passes with some difficulty, on account of their commu- 
nications with each other ; and it is conveyed by them to the 
thoracic duct, in the same state that it was when first im- 
bibed from the intestines. The lacteals, which pour the chyle 
into the bags, are similar to those which terminate in the cells 
of the mesenteric glands of other animals : there is also an 
analogy between the distribution of the lacteals on the inside 
of these bags, and that which we sometimes observe on the 
outside of the lymphatic glands in general. In either case, a 
certain number of the vasa inferentia, as they are termed, 
communicate with one another, and with other vessels, named 
vasa efferentia. 
By this communication, the progress of the fluids contained 
in these vessels is in some degree checked ; which impediment 
increases the effusion into the cavities of the gland made by 
