The actual process of nutrition in the living structure demonstrated by the microscope; and the renewal of the tissues and secretions, with the phenomena and products of inflammation, illustrated and established / [William Addison].

  • Addison, William, 1802-1881
Date:
1843-1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The actual process of nutrition in the living structure demonstrated by the microscope; and the renewal of the tissues and secretions, with the phenomena and products of inflammation, illustrated and established / [William Addison]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    of stages of its removal from the circulation, the larger it is, the more it is filled with molecules, and the less perfectly do the fluid contents fibrillate. Now, if it lie admitted, of which I have myself no doubt, that the fibrillatiug liquor sanguinis is changed into mucus in the interior of living cells, then there can be no difficulty in admitting that similar living cells, by a different mode of elabora- tion, may form not only sundry kinds of fibrous or mucous tissue, but the tears, saliva, milk, or bile. Experiment.—A woman applied for relief from pain and irritation in the eye, brought on by a drop of hot water which had accidentally got into it: there was very little injury done ; the conjunctiva was red, and there was considerable lachrymatiou. I took a perfectly transparent tear from the corner of the eye, and spreading it out a little I examined it, without any covering, by the microscope, and found great numbers of colourless corpuscles, vary- ing in figure; they appeared shrivelled. (Plate 2, fig. 3, a.)* I added a drop of pure water, and stirred them well together. In two minutes they presented the appearance shown in plate 2, fig. 3, b, and resembled exactly colourless blood corpuscles treated in the same manner. In five minutes I found that several had burst and had emitted molecular matter, the half-emptied integuments still contain- ing molecules and bright granules; others had increased more in magnitude; molecules and gra- nules were variously distributed within them, and in some of them there was a collapsed interior * Also plate 2, fig. 20, in the first series of these “ Researches Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, vol. xi.