On the lymphatics of the pancreas / by George Hoggan and Frances Elizabeth Hoggan.

  • Hoggan, George.
Date:
[1881]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the lymphatics of the pancreas / by George Hoggan and Frances Elizabeth Hoggan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    the pancreas; figs. 1, 3, and 9 are also errors. Of Leopold’s paper on the lymphatics of the uterus, fig. 8 is entirely wrong. It does not show a single lymphatic, and fig. 7, while it shows the lymphatics correctly in its lower half, shows a large number of what he calls lymphspalten, lymphrohren, &c., which have actually no existence. As that figure is probably a section from one of the uteri on plate i., we may take the whole of the figures in that plate to be equally erroneous. In an article on the structure of the uterus, in the Medicinskt Archiv of Stockholm, for 1867, Lindgren gives in fig. 2, plate iv., what he considers to be a view under a high power of the main lymphatics of the mucosa of the neck of the uterus, with lymphatic radicles proceeding from them. The two lymphatics lie parallel to each other, and between them lie a large number of branched cells in a transparent matrix. The blue injection fills the two lymphatics, and branches off from them along the spaces in which lie the so-called branched cells of the connective tissue. The drawing bears the stamp of honesty, as a reproduc- tion of the appearances seen, and, taking these appearances as they stand, they form a complete demonstration of the theory that the radicles of the lymphatics are the cavities surrounding, or in which lie, the cells of the connective tissue. But the whole thing is a deception. The great blue cavities, shown as lym- phatics, are not lymphatics, which have everywhere complete walls formed of endothelium, unlike the spaces seen in Lindgren’s drawing, and the cells separated from their matrix, by means of contraction of their substance, have allowed a certain amount of the blue fluid to penetrate between them from the large spaces. We have referred at some length to this example, on account of its value as an instance of the artificial cavities we have de- scribed. This list might be greatly extended, but the examples we have quoted may serve to show the serious character of the errors which at the present day are accepted as facts.1 It will 1 While the present paper was ip the hands of the printer, an article remark- ably illustrative of the mistakes wo deprecate has appeared in English. It is a research by Dr E. Klein on the lymphatics of the skin, and appears in the report of the medical officer to the Local Government Board. This research is illus- trated by twenty coloured plates, seventeen of these being of the lymphatics of tho skin of the Mammalia. In our opinion not one of the latter represents the lymphatic system. Nothing could bo more beautiful than the manner in which ,the coloured injection has followed the course or sheaths of the blood-vessels, breaking up into small branches as they break up, exactly as in the deceptive