Sanity and insanity / by Charles Mercier.

  • Mercier, Charles Arthur, 1852-1919.
Date:
1905
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Sanity and insanity / by Charles Mercier. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    general form and structure of a muscle is that of a more or less spindle-shaped bundle of fibres, having each end fixed into a bone. Between the two ends of the muscle the continuity of the bone is interrupted by a joint ; so that one end of the muscle is fixed into a bone above a joint, and the other end into a bone below. .The peculiar and characteristic property of muscles is their ability to contract when they are stimulated. When a muscle is stimulated, it contracts ; that is to say, it shortens and thickens, and this shortening and thickening are effected with great force, so that the ends of the muscles, and, with the ends, the bones, or whatever structures the Fig i Fig. 2. Diagram representing the general relation of muscles to bones. B E, bones ; J, joints ; M M», muscles. When M contracts and M,' lengthens, the limb is bent, as in Fig 2 ends are attached to, are brought together. In this way all bodily movements of every kind are effected, the whole of our ability to move and act depending entirely on this property of contraction that belongs to muscles; the great variety of the movements that we are able to execute, depending on the multiplicity and variety of our joints, and the various ways in which the muscles are disposed about them. By far the greatest bulk of every animal is composed of muscle. The muscles clothe the bones, and form almost the whole mass of the limbs, besides composing the fleshy ridges on each side of the back, the greater part of the neck, and the walls of the great cavities of the chest and abdomen.