On failure of brain power (encephalasthenia); its nature and treatment.

  • Althaus, Julius, 1833-1900.
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On failure of brain power (encephalasthenia); its nature and treatment. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    viz., that the neurone is nothing but a modified nerve-cell, and should, therefore, be known, as heretofore, by the term cell,' are invalid for various reasons. The neurone consists, then, essentially of three parts, viz., the nerve-cells (N.C., Fig. i); the axis-cylinder, oraxone (A.C.), and its collaterals: and the protoplasmic processes or den- drites (P.P.). The most important of these parts is the cell itself, with its dendrites, in which the nervous force is gene- rated, and which is the perceptive and impulsive element; while the axone, with its branches and collaterals, only plays the part of a conductor, by which the force is transmitted, whether to other cells, or the terminations of sensory areas, or contractile elements. I.—The Nerve-Cell. The grey nerve-cell, or neurocyte, upon which all nervous and mental phenomena depend, is a far more complicated structure than was formerly believed. Its anatomy has indeed only quite recently been thoroughly studied, more especially by Kolliker,^^ Berdez,^^ Schafer,^^ Rosin,^''^ Berkeley,®° Ramon y Cajal,^^ Dogiell,^^ Flemming,^^ Von Lenhossek,^^ Hodge,^^ and more especially by Nissl.^^ Want of space prevents me from fully entering into these researches. It must therefore suffice to say that the structure of the ganglionic cell appears to vary according to its degree of differentiation and function, inasmuch as cells of a certain type correspond to the position of the animal in the ascending scale of creation, being different in the invertebrate and the vertebrate; and again in the latter, in the fishes and reptiles on the one hand, and the birds and mammalia on the other. The structure of the cell becomes constantly more complex as we proceed higher up in the scale of living beings; and its histological structure would appear to be an expression of the different physiological activities with which the cells are endowed. They must, therefore, vary