MR. SKEY ON MUSCULAR FIBRE. 
377 
a single fibre, and from three to four times larger than the reputed globules of Sir 
E. Home and Mr. Bauer (Plate XVII. fig. 5.). 
I have counted on making a successful division of a fibre about 100 filaments, the 
number mentioned by Leuwenhoek, somewhat less than the half of which were in 
focus at the same time, those of the opposite side being brought into view, by a new 
adjustment of the microscope. A single globule suspended behind a separated fibre, 
would correspond to the breadth of about three filaments. 
Now the estimate of the diameter of a globule of blood by Dr. Wollaston and 
Captain Kater is the W-oo-lh part of an inch, from which the above calculation does 
not materially differ. A more recent admeasurement by M. Edwards * gives them a 
diameter of -g-l-th of a line. A single muscular fibre has a diameter of of an 
inch. A single globule of blood, which is about the twelfth part of the breadth of a 
fibre, T-Anrth of an inch. If each fibre contain 100 filaments, something less than the 
transverse breadth of the fibre, or forty, or allowing for the receding margins multi- 
plied by 400, is 16000, which is the breadth of a single filament. A globule of blood 
to the diameter of a filament is therefore as 4800 to 16000. If this calculation make 
any approach towards truth, the filaments cannot be composed of the globules of the 
blood, and they are not identical. 
I believe the appearance of globules, of which the filaments are asserted to be com- 
posed, is due to the delicate indentations of the transverse striae upon them, for the 
distinctness of the globular appearance is always proportionate to that of the trans- 
verse striae. I was, therefore, very desirous of examining the appearance in the fibre 
of an animal characterized by delicacy of the striae, and I found that in the Cod and 
the Haddock, in which they are most minute, the filaments being disencumbered of 
their connection to the cross bands or striae, pursue their course floating and twisted 
in all directions, without a trace of a globular appearance or mark of any kind, cylin- 
drical, and of uniform thickness throughout. 
Glutinous interior of the fibre . 
The interior of each fibre appears to contain a glutinous semitransparent substance, 
covering thickly the inner surface of the longitudinal filaments. It is very soluble 
in water, and when the end of a fibre is broken up, exhibiting its filamentous struc- 
ture, no trace of this substance is seen, but it is apparent on the internal surface of 
each fibre when the tube is exposed. It is this glutinous coating to the interior of 
the tube, that conceals from view in a degree the long filaments of the opposite sur- 
face, when that part of the fibre is brought into focus. 
Tube of the fibre. 
The divided extremity of each fibre presents the appearance of a jagged circle ter- 
minating an apparently hollow tube. For the most part these extremities are con- 
* Encyclopedia of Anatomy and Physiology. 
