PACTS AND OBSERVATIONS. 
283 
trepan, cut through the dura maters and made a slight inci¬ 
sion into the brain itself, in which he placed the ball, which 
gradually sank into the cerebral substance, making a kind of 
fistula that cicatrized. If the ball was not too big, the whole 
thickness of the cerebrum or cerebellum might be traversed 
without being accompanied or followed by any bad symptom 
or disturbance of functions. He states that, in 1822, he 
removed one lobe from the brain of various animals, who 
recovered perfectly, and only lost the sight of the opposite 
side; and he adds, ‘‘but the most remarkable thing was 
when I removed the whole cerebrum, or both lobes. The 
animal deprived of his brain survived more than a year, but 
he had lost all his senses and intelligence, and was reduced 
to an automaton.^^ In another instance he took away all the 
cerebellum, and this creature lived a year. It never regained 
regularity of movements. It was reduced to the condition of 
a drunken man. 
Distribution of Nerves. —In a paper communicated 
to the Royal Society Mr. Lionel Beale states :—“The nerves 
distributed to the voluntary muscles of the frog do not ter¬ 
minate in free ends, but there is reason for believing that 
complete nervous circuits exist. In all cases the fibres 
resulting from the division of the ordinary nerve fibres are so 
fine that many cannot be seen with a less magnif^^ing power 
than 1000 diameters, and there is evidence of the existence of 
fibres which could only be demonstrated by employing a 
much higher magnifying power. It is by these very fine 
fibres alone, and their nuclei, that the tissues are influenced. 
The ordinary nerve fibres are only the cords which connect 
this extensive peripheral system.^^ The author finds the 
same arrangements in the nerves of a man and the higher 
mammals, and also in the invertebrata. He employs a highly 
refractive fluid, such as syrup or glycerine, in these investi¬ 
gations.^^— Froc» Royal Soc,, No. 50. 
A New Dialysing Medium. — M. Ern. Guignet has 
experienced some difficulty in the employment of parchment 
paper as a dialysing medium in certain cases, those in which 
it is acted on by the solutions. He appears to entertain some 
doubts of the truth of Professor Graham’s proposition, that 
the parchment paper is actively concerned in the result by 
virtue of its colloidal property of becoming hydrated, and has 
sought to obtain some other substance which should admit 
of more general application. The medium which he recom¬ 
mends is porous or unglazed earthenwarej such as is used in the 
