CHAPTER I.

OF THE ANATOMY OF THE BRAIN.

HE following is a brief summary of Gall's Observations on the Anatomy of the Brain.

The nerves of the body do not consist of any medullary substance, they are only fibres. These fibres spring from each half of the spinal marrow in various fascicles, which arise, by the side of each other, from the cauda equina to the medulla oblongata. These fascicles are separated by furrows and a pulp resembling the substantia corticalis. Each of these fascicles consists of fine fibres, which are not separated by any intermediate body.

The unprofessional reader may pass over this chapter which is written more particularly for the experienced anatomist; while the doctrine of organs and general notions which follow afterwards, do not, in order to be understood, suppose in the reader any thing beyond the information which every man of education and general knowledge pos

sesses.

In

In large full grown animals these fascicles may be easily separated.

Besides these nerves, which, issuing from the spinal marrow may be called the diverging nerves (hinaustretende) there is another sort of nerves, which bear to those the relation of veins to arteries, and are formed where those terminate; as for instance, the perves which form the brain (cerebrum) in the cortical substance; these are the converging nerves (zurücktretende). But these converging

nerves do not actually reach the spinal marrow, but entering, on their way, into the two hemispheres of the brain and the parts hitherto considered as belonging to the brain; they meet together in four commissures of

sutures.

These nerves, thus eccentrically and concentrically formed, may be thus distinguished:

1. The characteristics of the diverging

nerves are;

a.) That they are harder to the touch, and may thus be recognised by a greater cohesion than the converging nerves.

b.) That they become stronger in their direction outwards, that is, from the spinal marrow to the surface of the brain.

c.) That