2 8
Scientific Memoirs by
cells is due to the numbers and size of the nucleoid bodies present in them,
which in association form a mulberry-like mass pressing upon the cell wall and
moulding it to the inequalities of its surface (Plate II., Fig. 2). Such tubercu
- l a t e b o d i e s o n s u p e r f i c i a l e x a m i n a t i o n p r e s e n t c e r t a i n p o i n t s o f r e s e m b l a n c e t o
the characteristic bodies in cases of Actinomycosis. On closer examination,
however, it is evident that they correspond structurally with the description
given above and are not due to any radiate aggregation of filaments.
In certain cases appearances apparently corresponding with the occurrence
of processes of cell division are present, the bodies of the cells being strongly
constricted so as to form two lobes connected by a narrow neck, or two distinct
cells occurring which, from their relations to one another and the character of
their opposed surfaces, seem to have just arisen due to the completion of such
a process (Plate II., Figs. 4,5). In many instances, too, a distribution of the
cells in little groups separated from one another by comparatively wide areas of
granulation tissue can be recognised, and may possibly be indicative of the
antecedent occurrence of processes of division (Plate I., Fig. I).
The individual cells in some cases are closely packed among the surround
- i n g l y m p h o i d e l e m e n t s ; i n a l a r g e n u m b e r o f i n s t a n c e s , h o w e v e r , t h e y a p p e a r t o
lie in a limited clear space (Pl. II., Fig. 4, 6). This appearance may possibly be an
artificial one arising as the result of shrinking during the course of preparation.
The number of cells visible in individual sections and in different parts of
the same section varies considerably. In some sections as many as eighty or
even more may be visible at once in a single field under a power of one hundred
and forty diameters. In others they are present in varying but smaller numbers,
and, in almost any, entire fields may in certain places fail to show any at all.
This failure may in many instances be due to imperfect success in staining, but
allowing this, there can be no doubt that the numbers present in different parts
of the tumour vary greatly.
It is only quite exceptionally that any are present in the epidermal stratum.
In one or two cases, however, I have detected specimens in the substance of
interpapillary processes in sites which they could not have reached by acciden
-tal transfer during the course of the preparation of the sections. The conti
- n u o u s s t r a t u m o f g r a n u l a t i o n - t i s s u e b e n e a t h t h e p a p i l l a r y l a y e r i s t h e s i t e i n
which they occur in greatest numbers, but specimens are also frequently present
in considerable numbers within the papillary eminences. It is in the central,
thickest portion of the continuous stratum that they occur in greatest numbers,
and in passing outwards laterally from this they tend to appear in progressively
smaller numbers, until towards the edges entire fields apparently devoid of them
may be encountered. In those sites where traces of hair-follicles remain re
- c o g n i s a b l e t h e y a r e o f t e n p r e s e n t i n s p e c i a l l y l a r g e n u m b e r s ( P l a t e I I . , F i g . 8 ) .
In the portion of the tumour next beneath this, where the neoplasm is no
longer continuous but is interposed in irregular masses between persisting por
-