AND FUNCTION OF THE LIVER. 
27 
(1.) That sugar, bile-pigment, and probably glycocol, can be detected in the hepatic 
cells. (2.) That cholic acid cannot be detected in them, and that therefore it is not 
necessarily united with the bile-pigment. (3.) That after abstinence from food sugar 
disappears from the liver. If these conclusions be admitted, it is clear that the 
hepatic cells do not form perfect bile ; they form sugar, and two of the biliary prin- 
ciples, but not the organic acid, which is probably the most important. 
Explanation of the Plate. 
PLATE I. 
Fig. ]. Ducts containing vesicles imbedded in pellucid and amorphous matter; they 
are such as I believe to have an active function. Diameter — r^ooth of an 
inch. 
Fig. 2. Gall-bladder, cystic, hepatic and common ducts in a very young fish, together 
with the intestine : the hepatic ducts appear as rudimentary developments 
from the cystic. 
Fig. 3. (a) An ultimate duct, with closed extremity, consisting of nuclei set in a 
sub-granular basis substance from liver of Frog. 
{h) {h) Two ducts containing the vesicular epithelium from a different part of 
same liver. The diameter of these two was, that of the larger of an 
inch, that of the smaller -g-g^i’d of an inch. The duct (a) had a diameter 
of 1 of an inch. 
(c) Duct from a young rabbit, dosed with blue pill ; it contains very 
numerous delicate vesicles with interposed oily molecules. Its diameter 
of an inch, that of the vesicles =-y^th of an inch. 
Fig. 4. Alimentary canal and liver of Tadpole, with gall-bladder and rudiment of 
duct, s, indicates the stomach ; t, the throat ; i, the commencement of 
the intestine; 1 1, the two lobes of the liver; g, the gall-bladder, lined by 
a vesicular epithelium ; d, the rudiment of the cystic duct. The liver con- 
sists of mere formative yolk matter ; the duct seemed to consist of similar 
substance but more opake ; it was not hollow ; its margin was very defined. 
The gall-bladder measured g^rd of an inch in diameter ; its cavity was 
filled by a clear fluid. 
Fig. 5. (A.) A terminal duct from the liver of a Guinea Pig; it had a most distinct 
closed extremity; its diameter=x^^th of an inch, that of its canal = 4 ^^th 
of an inch. It was seen lying along the wall of a tolerably sized portal 
canal. Some of the parenchymal cells are represented. 
(B.) Ducts from Squirrel’s liver; one is seen lying on the homogeneous tunic 
of a blood-vessel (a portal vein branch) ; its extremity was even, and was 
probably terminal; its nuclei were bile-tinged. The other duct has very 
E 2 
