Page:Philosophical Transactions - Volume 096.djvu/213

198 knowledge of the extent of the disease until the month of December, 1805.

At that time my attention was directed to this subject by the following circumstances. In the examination of the prostate gland of an elderly person, who had died in consequence of this part having been diseased, the nipple-like process was found very prominent, and a bridle, nearly ¼ of an inch in breadth, extended from the middle line of the tumour to the bulb of the urethra, where it insensibly disappeared. The usual rounded projection of the caput gallinaginis was not visible: it had wasted away, and the remains were concealed in the fold forming this bridle, which at that part was not thicker than at any other. The space between the tumour in the bladder, and the bulb of the urethra was unusually short, which is the reverse of what is commonly met with in old men; so that this bridle appeared to have drawn the bulb towards the tumour, and shortened the membranous part of the canal.

As this was an unusual appearance, it led me to consider it with attention, and to ask if other anatomists had noticed it; which as far as my inquiries have gone has not been the case. The bridle had evidently been formed by the membrane of the bladder adhering firmly to that part of the prostate gland composing the tumour, which it consequently followed in its future increase, and drew up after it the membrane of the urethra. In this way the fold had in time become nearly ¼ of an inch broad, and was continued of the same breadth to the bulb, where the lining of the urethra being more attached to the surrounding parts, it did not admit of being drawn up.