46 
Extracts from British and Foreign Journals. 
THE TERMINATION OE THE NERVES IN THE STRIATED 
MUSCLES. 
The termination of the nerves in striated muscles has 
given rise, in recent times, to numerous researches, which, 
notwithstanding all the interest which they present, have 
not yet cast a complete light on this part of science. It was 
thought, for instance, that the termination of the sensitive 
nerves in the muscles had been discovered; but these results, 
due to defective researches, cannot be considered as correct. 
Moreover, all the efforts which have been made to find in¬ 
termediate forms between the terminations in plates and the 
motor termination in the frog have remained without 
success. 
The process of colouring the nerves by means of chloride 
of gold, recently communicated by M. L. Ranvier, having 
furnished me w T ith an excellent and certain method for 
studying the nerve terminations, I have undertaken, w 7 ith 
this double object, a series of researches, which have led me 
to some new results. 
1st. The nervous fibres without myeline which are found 
in the thin muscles of the frog, as, for example, in the thoracic 
cutaneous muscle, and which had been regarded hitherto as 
sensitive fibres, do not belong to the muscle properly speak¬ 
ing, but to its aponeurosis. These fibres, arising from the 
intramuscular nerves, form in the aponeurosis a network of 
large meshes. Their terminations are identical with the 
nerve terminations which are found in the cornea. 
It is evident from their microscopic structure, as well as 
from their anatomical relations, that these nerves of the 
aponeurosis ought to be considered as centripetal nerves, 
starting from the muscle. The necessity of admitting the 
existence of these nerves is insisted on in a work which I 
have recently published. 
Nerve-fibres similar to those which I have just pointed out 
in the frog are also met w r ith in the aponeurosis of other 
animals. 
2nd. I have found it quite impossible to prove in the dis¬ 
sociated muscles of the frog, and of some other species of 
animals (tortoise, triton, lizard, snake, and rabbit), the pre¬ 
sence of nerve-fibres without myeline, other than those which 
belong to the vascular or aponeurotic nerves, and the presence 
of nerve terminations, other than the motor terminations. 
