| OCR Text |
Show •] PROF. W. H. FLOWER ON THE MUSK-DEER. 169 into an upper and lower cavity; or perhaps it can be more correctly described as an elongated conical pouch, folded sharply on itself in a sigmoid manner, with constrictions projecting into the interior, at the inner bends of the folds. The lowest constriction, situated on the left border of the organ, is deep, and the projecting pouches above and below it very distinct; and their apices, having different directions, cross each other, the upper one projecting forwards, and the lower or larger one (the fundus or distal end of the whole cavity, figs. 6 & 7, a) turning backwards. Fig. 7. Posterior or dorsal aspect of the stomach, one fourth natural size. 0, oesophagus ; Ru, rumen; a, its apex; Re, reticulum; P, psalterium; A, abomasus; p, pylorus. The villi lining the interior of the rumen are slender and cylindrical and very slightly clavate. They nowhere exceed 0"*15 in length, and are largest at the anterior and lower part of the upper pouch. As usual, they are exceedingly short, though not absent, on the edges of the projecting ridges, and over certain points become very fine and sparsely scattered, as on the posterior surface, a little way above and below the constriction, in two rather distinct patches at each place, and more especially at the apex of the lowest or terminal pouch. On the middle of the anterior surface, immediately above the constricting band, where this is subsiding at its left extremity, is a small oval orifice, T\> inch long, placed transversely, leading into a little (apparently) glandular pouch in the walls of the stomach. The diminished size and concentric arrangement of the villi immediately around this opening evidently show that it is a natural structure. In the reticulum (Be), the ridges enclosing the polygonal spaces |
