5GG 
PROFESSOR E. A. SCHAFER ON THE 
It seemed at first sight almost incredible that with such a prodigious number of 
nerve-fibres, exhibiting so close an interlacement, there should be no actual junctions 
of the intercrossing nerves. And it was especially difficult of credence because some 
of the experiments of Mr. Romanes, performed with the view of testing the amount 
of section which the tissue could endure without loss of nervous (or excitational) 
continuity, seemed to point to the existence of a structurally continuous network of 
nerve-fibres. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that the fibres do not come into 
anatomical continuity. On the other hand, it can readily be seen that each nerve- 
fibre comes at one or more points of its course into very close relations with other 
nerve-fibres. Two fibres, for example, may sometimes be observed to bend towards 
each other out of their previous course, in order to run closely side by side for a 
greater or less distance, and in such cases one fibre may hook round the other (fig. 6), 
or they may even be two or three times intertwined. At other places a number of 
fibres come together from different parts and join in a very close entanglement, the 
fibres in which run for the most part parallel (figs. 7 and 15), and it is only with 
difficulty that the individual fibres can be followed. So that although there is no 
actual anatomical continuity, abundant opportunity is afforded for inductive action, 
whether electrical or of some other kind. That physiological continuity is thus 
maintained it seems as yet premature to conjecture. 
Mode of termination of the nerve-fibres . — Most of the fibres end, as already 
mentioned, in a gradually tapering extremity, which is sometimes bifid (fig. 16, x vl . ) . 
This, so far as could be seen, does not actually enter a muscular fibre, although since 
there is no sarcolemma it comes in close contact with the muscular substance. In 
some instances the nerve-ending takes the form of a fusiform dilatation (fig. 11, x.), 
which may contain a small nucleus ; in other cases the dilatation is more marked, 
and may even form a triangular flattened expansion within which a number of nuclei 
can be detected (fig. 8, p.). These expansions of the end of the nerve appear to 
represent a primitive form of the motorial end plate. 
The nerve-cells . — The cells vary in size, but for the most part are roundly fusiform 
bodies, averaging '05 millim. in length, and '015 millim. in diameter. As stained 
with gold they are of characteristic appearance, and present a marked resemblance 
to the bipolar cells which are met with in the spinal ganglia of fish, or to those 
which are found interpolated in the course of the nerves distributed to the ciliary 
muscle in the human eye. The cell -substance is granular in the gold prepara- 
tion, but extraordinarily clear and pellucid when examined fresh ; in this respect 
resembling the ganglion cells of the human retina. An appearance of striation 
radiating from the poles into the substance of the cell is sometimes faintly visible. 
The nucleus, which is not coloured by the gold salt, is either spherical or ovoid : 
it is clear and vesicular, and contains a very characteristic nucleolus. The nucleus 
is generally situate nearer to one of the extremities of the cell, rarely in the 
centre. The cell itself is not always evenly fusiform, but is often bulged out at one 
