On the secretory apparatus of the liver / by C. Handfield Jones ; [communicated by Sir Benjamin C. Brodie].

  • Jones, C. Handfield (Charles Handfield), 1819-1890.
Date:
1846
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the secretory apparatus of the liver / by C. Handfield Jones ; [communicated by Sir Benjamin C. Brodie]. 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 wall of the ducts, preserving still the general outline ; it seems therefore certain that the basement membrane is only a temporary structure, which disappears when the cells are actively discharging their contents. A forcible and instructive contrast to the above condition was exhibited by a liver which I examined, which was in an advanced stage of fatty degeneration ; in this the linear arrangement of the cells was lost; they lay confusedly together, and were gorged with their fatty contents; the margin of the lobule, far from exhibiting any tendency to discharge the retained secretion, was invested, and, as it were, closely bound by a membrane, not of the delicate transparent texture of the basement tissue, but much more opake, and closely resembling the semi-fibrous aspect of thin layers of false membrane*. I may here observe that I have not been able to find any epithelium lining the interlobular ducts ; the basement membrane, where it exists, appears quite bare, and through its trans- parent texture the terminal cells can be plainly discerned with their granular or oily contents; this is not in accordance with Mr. Bowman’s opinion, who considers “the epithelium of the lobules to be continuous with that of the ducts from this how- ever I am led, both by observation and the bearing of the facts now related, to dis- sent: it then becomes a question, in what manner does the epithelium of the larger ducts terminate ? This is difficult to determine, but I am inclined to think that it serves only as a lining to those ducts which have no secreting parietes, and that in these it supplies the mucous secretion, with which we know they are lubricated. In the gall-bladder of a sheep examined immediately after death, the basement mem- brane of the plicae was found to be beset with particles which had not the usual finely mottled aspect of columnar epithelium, but seemed to be composed of veiy minute globules ; in a short time these dissolved away into an amorphous matter. In the hepatic duct the epithelial particles were very small, about Toooth of an inch in dia- meter ; these also disappeared very soon ; the general surface was covered by a great number of globules considerably larger, but of very various size, which closely resembled the mucous globules in the secretion of the nose or pharynx. A similar appearance was observed in the hepatic duct of a dog, where after a very short time, the epithelial particles covering the surface became converted into groups of minute globules; according to this view, the excretory part of the duct would have its own peculiar protecting epithelium, preparing the surface for the passage of the bile furnished by the secretory portion'!'. From all the facts which have been now related, it may, I think, be concluded, that the cells forming the margin of the lobule are those in which the elaboration of the secretion is perfected, and that as this is effected, they burst and discharge * In cases of this kind the primary cell membrane is often seen to be manifestly altered, appearing striated and of a coarser texture. f I have ascertained subsequently, by examination of perfectly recent specimens, that there is occasionally a layer of epithelium on the free surface of the basement membrane, hut it is extremely delicate when it exists, is often absent, and does not appear to be in any way continuous with the secreting epithelium of the lobules.