Darwiniana : Essays — Volume 02Huxley, Thomas Henry
Science
Darwiniana : Essays — Volume 02
Huxley, Thomas Henry
Darwin, Charles, 1809-1882; Evolution (Biology)
Here would be the upper part of the animal--that great mass of bones that
we spoke of as the spine (_a_, Fig. 1). Here I should have the
alimentary canal (_b_, Fig. 1). Here I should have the heart
(_c_, Fig. 1); and then you see, there would be a kind of double tube,
the whole being inclosed within the hide; the spinal marrow would be placed
in the upper tube (_a_, Fig. 1), and in the lower tube (_d d_,
Fig. 1), there would be the alimentary canal (_b_), and the heart
(_e_); and here I shall have the legs proceeding from each side. For
simplicity's sake, I represent them merely as stumps (_e e_, Fig. 1).
Now that is a horse--as mathematicians would say--reduced to its most
simple expression. Carry that in your minds, if you please, as a simplified
idea of the structure of the horse. The considerations which I have now put
before you belong to what we technically call the "Anatomy" of the horse.
Now, suppose we go to work upon these several parts,--flesh and hair, and
skin and bone, and lay open these various organs with our scalpels, and
examine them by means of our magnifying-glasses, and see what we can make
of them. We shall find that the flesh is made up of bundles of strong
fibres The brain and nerves, too, we shall find are made up of fibres, and
these queer-looking things that are called ganglionic corpuscles. If we
take a slice of the bone and examine it, we shall find that it is very like
this diagram of a section of the bone of on ostrich, though differing, of
course, in some details; and if we take any part whatsoever of the tissue,
and examine it, we shall find it all has a minute structure, visible only
under the microscope. All these parts constitute microscopic anatomy or
"Histology." These parts are constantly being changed; every part is
constantly growing, decaying, and being replaced during the life of the
animal. The tissue is constantly replaced by new material; and if you go
back to the young state of the tissue in the case of muscle, or in the case
of skin, or any of the organs I have mentioned, you will find that they all
come under the same condition. Every one of these microscopic filaments and
fibres (I now speak merely of the general character of the whole
process)--every one of these parts--could be traced down to some
modification of a tissue which can be readily divided into little particles
of fleshy matter, of that substance which is composed of the chemical
elements, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, having such a shape as
this (Fig. 2). These particles, into which all primitive tissues break up,
are called cells. If I were to make a section of a piece of the skin of my
hand, I should find that it was made up of these cells. If I examine the
fibres which form the various organs of all living animals, I should find
that all of them, at one time or other, had been formed out of a substance
consisting of similar elements; so that you see, just as we reduced the
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