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Show Vasorum, 0f tbc Coats, Irritabilily, Illusculm'ily, V11er and Sensibility, of Lac/ails and Lyntpbrztics‘. absorbed the fluids thrown to." In Mr. Hunter's experiments, the lacteals ication by the nerves With into the intestines, independant of any commun of the intestines and the brain; for the trunks of the nerves of that part , then enclosed in a liga- nesentery were, with the trunks of the arteries must have their corresponding veins, and I can have no doubt of their being attended with lymphatics. The red lines which appear under the skin, when poisons are passing into the blood from the surface of the body, furnish us with another proof of the vascularity of their coats. The course of these lines, and the subsequent inflammation of the gland, show these es to contract and re ture. The muscular flesh of the turtle continu after the animal‘s head lax, from the stimulus of the air only, many hours power of ac‘ is cttt off. The absorbents appear to me to have a similar is dead. animal the after time some for ng absorbi of capable tion, and to be that they h'litljilglll had before said, that one would be tempted to believe not vascular? It has been objected, that these red streaks alluded to cannot be lymphatic vessels, from the circumstance of their frequently having considerable breadth, whilst the diameters of the superficial lymphatics are I known to be very small; but those who make this objection forget, that, ofthe tied up the trunks of the arteries and veins belonging to a portion though the poison enters at first one vessel only, yet, from the anastomosis of these vessels, it presently pervades a number of parallel branches, and inflaming them all, produces the breadth of the red streak. They ought likewise to attend to this circumstance, that the inflamed lymphatics, from the well-known sympathy in surrounding parts, become a cause of inflam- mation, not only in the investing cellular substance, but in the skin which the experiment. absorbed after death, and I was determined to tnake (the intestines great intestine in an ass, which had been dead a few minutes I knew were still in the cavity of the abdomen, and the parts not cold.) , that the trunks of the absorbents must be enclosed in the ligature though not one of them was then visible. Two hours after I returned, and found a number of absorbents turgid with a transparent fluid. I opened one of to be inflamed lymphatic vessels. How could they inflame, if they were could not the largest with a lancet; the fluid issued in a stream, which it covers them. have done, unless the vessels had continued to absorb, and to propel their putting on no other appearance than might have been expected from a sin- gle vessel only being thus affected. A physician of much observation, and belonging to one of the first hospitals in town, tells me, he has seldom seen these red lines. I have seen the penis covered with them in gonorr- hoea. I have now a case before me of erysipelas; on the top of the foot, the absorbents are seen inflamed and making red lines on the back of the leg and inside of the thigh, all the way to the groin, so that not only from broken surfaces, but from unbroken, and merely inflamed surfaces, these red lines sometimes rise. Having thus considered the vasa vasorum of lymphatics, we come next fluids with great force, after the death of the system. Lymphatics and lacteals, then, have coats, which are irritable and nuts- "mm" 63 cular. It will be presumed, they are also vascular: we can demonstrate that they are so. That the coats of arteries and veins are themselves vas- cular, has been long known. Anatomists not only saw the little arteries and veins full of blood in the recently dead body, but they injected them with coloured fluids, from the cavities of the trunks on which they rami- fled. They termed these vessels vasa vasorum. I do not Find them dc- scribing lymphatics amongst the vasa vasorum. I have seen the aorta, however, almost through its whole length, covered with these vessels, which I had injected with quicksilver. It is even usual for the trunks of the absorbents to make grooves in the coats of arteries: they are also often so numerous, as to conceal them entirely in their ramifications. The lympha- tics and lacteals themselves have their vasa vasorum. I have injected, in quadrupcds, the arteries on the coats of the lymphatic vessels, and seen them ramifying very elegantly through their substance. These arteries must I have sometimes, however, seen the inflamed lymphatic to enquire whether the nerves also ramify on their coats, or what inter- course appears to take place between the absorbent and nervous system. The nerves are found either forming nct- vork on the coats of arteries, enclosing them in the form of rings, or making semicircular turns round their great trunks: accordingly, their actions are very much influenced by the state of the mind and brain. Thus, from a particular state of the mind, the blood is determined to the face in blushing, or called from it in fear. In a ‘4": ~&.. _ 6 |