General Anatomy, Applied to Physiology and Medicine, Vol. 1 (of 3)Bichat, Xavier
Science
General Anatomy, Applied to Physiology and Medicine, Vol. 1 (of 3)
Bichat, Xavier
Human anatomy; Human physiology
The exposition of the following systems will show us the varieties
that exist as it respects the nerves. 1st. In some there are many of
them, as in the mucous, dermoid and muscular systems of animal and
organic life. 2d. In others we find fewer of them, as in the cellular,
glandular systems, &c. 3d. Some require a more attentive examination
than has heretofore been made of their nerves, which are little known,
as the serous, the medullary, a portion of the fibrous, &c. 4th. In
fine, many, as the cartilaginous, the fibro-cartilaginous, the pilous,
the epidermoid, the tendons of the fibrous, &c. are evidently destitute
of nerves.
We are ignorant of the situation of each nervous filament at its
termination; is it deprived of its covering, and does the pulp only
penetrate the interior of the fibres? In the optic nerve this last
arrangement is evident. The covering of the nerve is continued only to
the entrance of the eye, and the pulp is expanded to form the retina.
A similar expansion seems to take place in the olfactory and the
auditory. But nothing is known concerning any of the others.
ARTICLE SECOND.
ORGANIZATION OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM OF ANIMAL LIFE.
I. _Texture peculiar to this organization._
Every nerve is formed, as I have said, of a greater or less number
of cords lying in apposition to each other. These cords arise from
filaments likewise in apposition and united together, like the cords
by cellular texture. I have already mentioned how both are interlaced
in the interior of the nerve, so as to form a kind of plexus, which
differs from the true plexus only in this, that the branches applied to
each other, do not allow us at first view to see their intermixing.
The general character of the nervous cords varies considerably. 1st.
Their size is not always the same. Those of the sciatic and the crural
are smaller than those of the brachial nerves, except those of the
median. 2d. Some nerves, as the par vagum, are formed of one cord only,
divided by many furrows. Sometimes the filaments form around it a
net-work, a very delicate kind of plexus. 3d. In the same nerve, there
is sometimes united large and small cords; in many they are all equal,
as in the sciatic. 4th. The optic nerve, though furrowed in its whole
extent, from the commissure to the eye, does not appear to have in its
interior that interlacing, that the others evidently exhibit. 5th. In
the posterior part of this nerve, and in the trunk of the olfactory,
the cords are not distinct. 5th. Most of their nerves at their origin
are separate in their filaments; the trigemini on the contrary,
exhibit a common pulpous portion, in which all their's seem to be
implanted, &c.
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