The first detail to attract the eye is the epiglottis, which appears as a yellowish-red arch reaching from side to side across the image. It is thicker in the middle than at either end, and a protuberance is usually seen in the centre pointing forward. This arch is the upper margin of the epiglottis, and the protuberance is the tubercle, situated near the insertion of the epiglottis into the thyroid cartilage. The shape as well as the color of the epiglottis is very variable in different individuals, being sometimes rounded as in the drawings, sometimes rolled up like a dried leaf, sometimes notched in the centre, and sometimes presenting a point at this place. However, all these variations in shape have nothing to do with any pathological process, and may therefore be termed normal. The color of the organ also varies from a bluish-yellow to a pink-red, and these variations are also normal, being due to a greater or less thickness of the tissue covering the cartilage, which by shining through imparts its bluish color to the tissue. The superficial blood-vessels also are more prominent in some individuals than in others, and may not be noticeable in some cases. {32} Immediately behind the epiglottis we see two pit-like depressions, separated from each other in the middle by a fold of mucous membrane and bounded on either side by similar folds less prominent. These folds are the glosso-epiglottic ligaments, and serve to connect the tongue with the epiglottis, while the depressions are the glosso-epiglottic grooves, in which we usually find the foreign bodies which have accidentally been swallowed. The ends of the epiglottic arch are lost in folds of mucous membrane, which run forward and inward to meet in the median line some distance in front of the epiglottis. Along their course several nodules of different size are noticed, which are symmetrically situated on either side. The one nearest to the epiglottis is the cartilage of Wrisberg, a small cartilaginous nodule imbedded in the tissue. The larger one, situated at the end of the fold of mucous membrane, is the arytenoid cartilage, and a third small nodule is noticed close to the arytenoid cartilage between it and the cartilage of Wrisberg, which is called the capitulum Santorini. The folds of mucous membrane are termed the aryteno-epiglottidean or ary-epiglottic folds. Their color is normally of a pinkish-red, and does not vary much in different individuals.