ble. The two bones are called the radius and the ulna. Above, i. e. towards the elbow, a tubercle of the radius plays into a socket of the ulna; whilst below, i. e. towards the wrist, the radius finds the socket, and the ulna the tubercle. A single bone in the fore-arm, with a ball and socket joint at the elbow, which admits of motion in all directions, might, in some degree, have answered the purpose of both moving the arm and turning the hand. But how much better it is accomplished by the present mechanism, any person may convince himself, who puts the ease and quickness, with which he can shake his hand at the wrist circularly (moving likewise, if he pleases, his arm at the elbow at the same time), in competition with the comparitively slow and laborious motion, with which his arm can be made to turn round at the shoulder, by the aid of a ball and socket joint.

HI. The spine, or back-bone, is a chain of joints of very wonderful construction. Various, difficult, and almost inconsistent offices were to be executed by the same instrument. It was to be firm, yet flexible, (now I know no chain made by art, which is both these; for by firmness I mean, not only strength, but stability); firm, to support the erect position of the body; flexible, to allow of the bending of the trunk in all degrees of curvature. It was farther also (which is another, and quite a distinct purpose from the rest) to become a pipe or conduit for the safe conveyance from the brain, of the most important fluid of the animal frame, that, namely, upon which all voluntary motion depends, the spinal marrow; a substance not only of the first necessity to action, if not to life, but of a nature so delicate and tender, so susceptible and so impatient of injury, as that any unusual pressure upon it, or any considerable obstruction of its course, is

followed by paralysis or death. Now the spine was not only to furnish the main trunk for the passage of the medullary substance from the brain, but to give out, in the course of its progress, small pipes therefrom, which, being afterwards indefinitely subdivided, might, under the name of nerves, distribute this exquisite supply to every part of the body. The same spine was also to serve another use not less wanted than the preceding, viz. to afford a fulcrum, stay, or basis (or, more properly speaking, a series of these), for the insertion of the muscles which are spread over the trunk of the body; in which trunk there are not, as in the limbs, cylindrical bones, to which they can be fastened: and, likewise, which is a similar use, to furnish a support for the ends of the ribs to rest upon.

Bespeak of a workman a piece of mechanism which shall comprise all these purposes, and let him set about to contrive it: let him try his skill upon it; let him feel the difficulty of accomplishing the task, before he be told how the same thing is effected in the animal frame. Nothing will enable him to judge so well of the wisdom which has been employed; nothing will dispose him to think of it so truly. First, for the firmness, yet flexibility, of the spine; it is composed of a great number of bones (in the human subject, of twenty-four) joined to one another, and compacted by broad bases. The breadth of the bases upon which the parts severally rest, and the closeness of the junction, give to the chain its firmness and stability; the number of parts, and consequent frequency of joints, its flexibility. Which flexibility, we may also observe, varies in different parts of the chain; is least in the back, where strength, more than flexure, is wanted; greater in the loins, which it was necessary should be more supple than the back; and greatest of all in the

neck, for the free motion of the head. Then, secondly, in order to afford a passage for the descent of the medullary substance, each of these bones is bored through in the middle in such a manner, as that, when put together, the hole in one bone falls into a line, and corresponds with the holes in the two bones contiguous to it. By which means, the perforated pieces, when joined, form an entire, close, uninterrupted channel; at least, whilst the spine is upright, and at rest. But, as a settled posture is inconsistent with its use, a great difficulty still remained, which was to prevent the vertebræ shifting upon one another, so as to break the line of the canal as often as the body moves or twists; or the joints gaping externally, whenever the body is bent forward, and the spine thereupon made to take the form of a bow. These dangers, which are mechanical, are mechanically provided against. The vertebræ, by means of their processes and projections, and of the articulations which some of these form with one another at their extremities, are so locked in and confined, as to maintain, in what are called the bodies or broad surfaces of the bones, the relative position nearly unaltered; and to throw the change and the pressure, produced by flexion, almost entirely upon the intervening cartilages, the springiness and yielding nature of whose substance admits of all the motion which is necessary to be performed upon them, without any chasm being produced by a separation of the parts. I of all the motion which is necessary;

say,

for although we bend our backs to every degree almost of inclination, the motion of each vertebra is very small: such is the advantage we receive from the chain being composed of so many links, the spine of so many bones. Had it consisted of three or four bones only; in bending the body, the spinal marrow must have

been bruised at every angle. The reader need not be told, that these intervening cartilages are gristles; and he may see them in perfection in a loin of veal. Their form also favours the same intention. They are thicker before than behind; so that, when we stoop forward, the compressible substance of the cartilage, yielding in its thicker and anterior part to the force which squeezes it, brings the surface of the adjoining vertebræ nearer to the being parallel with one another than they were before, instead of increasing the inclination of their planes, which must have occasioned a fissure or opening between them. Thirdly, for the medullary canal giving out in its course, and in a convenient order, a supply of nerves to different parts of the body, notches are made in the upper and lower edge of every vertebra; two on each edge; equi-distant on each side from the middle line of the back. When the vertebræ are put together, these notches, exactly fitting, form small holes, through which the nerves, at each articulation, issue out in pairs, in order to send their branches to every part of the body, and with an equal bounty to both sides of the body. The fourth purpose assigned to the same instrument, is the insertion of the bases of the muscles, and the support of the ends of the ribs; and for this fourth purpose, especially the former part of it, a figure, specifically suited to the design, and unnecessary for the other purposes, is given to the constituent bones. Whilst they are plain, and round, and smooth, towards the front, where any roughness or projection might have wounded the adjacent viscera, they run out, behind, and on each side, into long processes, to which processes the muscles necessary to the motions of the trunk are fixed; and fixed with such art, that, whilst the vertebræ supply a basis for the muscles, the muscles

help to keep these bones in their position, or by their tendons to tie them together.

:

That most important, however, and general property, viz. the strength of the compages, and the security against luxation, was to be still more specially consulted for, where so many joints were concerned, and where, in every one, derangement would have been fatal, it became a subject of studious precaution. For this purpose, the vertebræ are articulated, that is, the moveable joints between them are formed by means of those projections of their substance, which we have mentioned under the name of processes; and these so lock in with, and overwrap one another, as to secure the body of the vertebra, not only from accidentally slipping, but even from being pushed out of its place by any violence short of that which would break the bone. I have often remarked and admired this structure in the chine of a hare. In this, as in many instances, a plain observer of the animal economy may spare himself the disgust of being present at human dissections, and yet learn enough for his information and satisfac tion, by even examining the bones of the animals which come upon his table. Let him take, for example, into his hands, a piece of the clean-picked bone of a hare's back; consisting, we will suppose, of three vertebræ. He will find the middle bone of the three so implicated, by means of its projections or processes, with the bone on each side of it, that no pressure which he can use, will force it out of its place between them. It will give way neither forward, nor backward, nor on either side. In whichever direction he pushes, he perceives, in the form, or junction, or over-lapping of the bones, an impediment opposed to his attempt; a check and guard against dislocation. In one part of the spine, he will find a still farther fortifying expedient, in the mode