Cases and observations on the molluscum contagiosum of Bateman : with an account of the minute structure of the tumours / by Robert Paterson.

  • Paterson, Robert, 1814-1889.
Date:
[1840?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Cases and observations on the molluscum contagiosum of Bateman : with an account of the minute structure of the tumours / by Robert Paterson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

    9/17 (page 7)
    ing, consequently, two and a-half or three times the size of pus.glo- bules, and three and a-half times as large as those of blood. This body will be observed to consist of an external, thin, and transpa- rent membranous vesicle, («,) somewhat flattened in its shape, and when these bodies are massed together serving to unite them ; and of an external vesicle, {b,) generally filled, as represented in the figure, with small granular matter. This granular mass, (c), in some, filled completely the tunic vesicle ; in others, as in that represented. Fig. 10, it receded from its inner wall. These nucleated granules have, in fiact, some resemblance to those of the epithelium. Some of the granules do not possess the external vesicle as seen in Fig. 9, and others possess it of larger size. This Professor Thomson is in- clined to attribute to the more or less mature state of the secre- tions. The external vesicle not being yet developed until it reaches very nearly the free surface of the secreting cells, in this way the smaller size of the vesicles towards the outer extremity of the se- creting cell, and their large size towards its internal or mammillary extremity, is easily accounted for—the external scale or vesicle not being at first developed, but its development and increase in size taking place as it becomes fit for evolution. In this way we find that the formation of this diseased structure is very similar to the development of animal and vegetable tissue, and not unlike that which Miiller has described as taking place in the development of some kinds of carcinomatous structure. The manner in which this disease must be communicated resem- bles much the account which Schwann and Schleiden have given of the development of animal and vegetable tissue.* The nuclei pro- trude young cellules, which project from their surface as the watch- glass from the watch. As growth proceeds, the young cell increases in size, while the nucleus remains imbedded in its wall. Fresh nuclei form within the cavity of these young cells, and from a repeti- tion of this process result successive generations of cells. The walls of the young cells are perfectly transparent, but those of the older cells become thickened, and in animal tissues often converted more or less into a fibrous structure. When one of these peculiar granules of which the milky fluid of this disease is composed, enters a se- baceous follicle, a similar process to that just described of nucle- olar increase and cellular development take place,—the external vesicle of the primitive cell soon assuming a fibrous structure, and constituting the investing membrane of the subsequent tumours. The peculiar cells of which the white fluid is composed are easily distinguished by a very moderate magnifying power, and appear to be peculiar to this disease, in so far as I have been able to observe. With this view I have observed microscopically the contents of athe- romatous and melliceritious tumours, the contents of sebaceous fol- licles in health and in disease, &c., but have not been able to see anything similar. As a proof of their being easily distinguished again under the microscope, I found a small abscess at the base of a cluster of these tumours on the neck of one of the patients. I took • On the Nature and Structural Characteristics of Morbid Growths, by J. Mul- w. M. D., translated by C. West, M. D. 1840, p. 21.