.SVrEvERARD Home on the 
3 6 
urinary bladder, I have upon a former occasion established, 
since they arrived there when both the pylorus and thoracic 
duct were tied up, and the spleen was removed out of the 
body ; but till the fact of valvular vessels supplying the 
office of absorbents was ascertained, any opinion respecting 
the route of fluids from the stomach, must continue to be 
entirely hypothetical. 
Upon the present occasion, through Mr. Bauer’s means, 
I am not only enabled to demonstrate vessels so constructed 
in the coats of the stomach, but to give abundant collateral 
evidence of their acting as absorbents, even more than can 
be produced respecting those of the brain. 
It immediately suggested itself to me, that this was the 
probable use of the branches of the vas breve, the presence of 
which upon the coats of the stomach, so well supplied with 
veins from other trunks, is not easily accounted for. 
In the first instance, with the assistance of Mr. Clift, I 
injected the splenic artery, and requested Mr. Bauer to as- 
certain, whether any minute branches, spread upon the great 
curvature of the stomach, in a contrary direction to those in- 
jected arteries, had valves. Such vessels were found, and quite 
empty. They had valves very distinctly marked : he showed 
them to me, so as perfectly to satisfy me of the fact. Having 
got thus far, I requested the assistance of Mr. Chevalier, 
House Surgeon to St. George’s Hospital, who has given, at 
different times, considerable time and attention to preparing 
the stomach and spleen for Mr. Bauer’s observations ; which 
he has been better enabled to do, from being more in the 
habit of injecting the blood vessels, than students in surgery 
