16 dr. C. H. JONES ON THE STRUCTURE, DEVELOPMENT 
livers*, in a very remarkable manner in the marginal cells of the lobules, so as to 
form a complete opake border to them ; and these same oil-laden cells are seen at 
times dehiscing, and apparently discharging their contents into the fissure. 
But oil is not bile, and therefore this very case becomes an objection to the view 
of Mr. Bowman ; for if bile is perfected in the marginal cells, it ought to be manifest 
and preponderating there, which in these instances, and indeed generally, is not, as 
far as I have seen, the case. Another condition, which I have several times observed 
in Human livers not seriously diseased, also appears to speak counter to the view of 
bile being perfected in the marginal cells of the lobules. In these, for instance, when 
a transverse section had been made, the central part of the lobules was seen of a 
distinct yellow tint, the cells manifestly containing bile ; this colour shaded off towards 
the margin, and ceased some distance from thence, while the miarginal cells them- 
selves, for a depth of two or three in the central direction, were the seat of con- 
siderable oily accumulation. This could hardly have occurred if the perfection of bile 
by the marginal cells were a necessary step in the process^. 
Though not at all essential, though 1 believe the ducts often form bile when none 
exists in the marginal cells, still there does appear to be a peculiar tendency m the 
cells in this situation to fill themselves with biliary matter. I have seen bile in the 
marginal zone of cells when all the rest of the lobules was in a state of complete 
degeneration ; I have observed in the liver of an animal, to whom calomel had been 
given, bile, though present elsewhere, yet most abundant on the margins of the 
lobules; I have seen a similar state, accumulation of bile in the marginal cells, 
occasionally in Human livers ; and lastly, I have often found biliary deposits adhering 
to the ducts in the oily livers of fish, occupying thus an analogous situation to that 
of the bile in the preceding instances. 
The circumstance that oil in many cases accumulates particularly in the marginal 
zone of cells, seems to me most probably accounted for by the relation of this part 
to the circulating blood. These marginal cells are, in fact, the first which are exposed 
to the stream of portal blood as it enters the lobular capillary plexus ; they conse- 
quently obtain most abundantly the oily matter therein contained, and store it up in 
their cavities ; this, I think, is a more probable view, according to our present know- 
ledge of the habits of cells, than to suppose that the oil is transmitted from the 
* Vide Report of the Pathological Society. 1846, 1847, p. 105. 
t When a liver presents the “ nutmeg appearance ” in the most marked manner, the following is commonl} 
found to be the condition of the structure. There is fatty degeneration of the marginal zone of the lobules, 
which is thereby rendered quite pale ; while the central part, occupying perhaps rather more than a half, is 
uniformly saturated by a deep venous congestion. The cells in this part are in great measure destroyed, 
reduced to a granular detritus, and the remaining ones are converted into spherical masses of orange pigment. 
The sanguine congestion and the pigmentary accumulation are precisely coterminous. Now unless the ducts 
themselves are the effective agents, how can such a structure secrete bile ? How is the central yellow pigment to 
be conveyed through the marginal zone of fatty degeneration ? 
