Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 4.djvu/652

634 than usual—larger even than the basilar. In these unusually-arranged arteries were very important changes. Commencing at an inch below the anterior edge of the pons Varolii and extending downward, the walls of the left vertebral artery were stiff, in part calcified, and its linings loose. At half an inch from the point just mentioned, immediately over the left olivary body, was a reddish-yellow, opaque, friable plug (thrombus), completely obstructing the vessel; still lower was another more recent, but probably ante-mortem plug. The first was one quarter of an inch long, the second four inches long. A third plug, an inch long, was above the first, and touching it. Opposite the middle of the pons there was atheromatous degeneration of the basilar artery. The walls of the internal carotids were also in part calcified. The posterior part of the right cerebellar lobe (the side on which the vertebral artery was exceedingly small) was softer than usual, the corresponding foliations swollen and indistinctly defined, indicating disease of this part, probably consequences of the changes in the arteries.

The weight of the entire brain was 53.4 avoirdupois ounces $$=$$ 1,495 grammes; allowing a diminution in the weight of the brain, from the age of thirty-five or forty years, at the rate of one ounce avoirdupois for each, ten years elapsed, the greatest weight of the brain may be estimated at 56.5 avoirdupois ounces.

Weight of right anterior lobe (separated with the fissure of Rolando for a guide), 234 grammes; weight of left anterior lobe, 233 grammes. Heart large, muscular fibre firm and of good color. The attached portion of the aortic valves rigid, the mitral opening large. In the left ventricle, at the lower third, a firm, organized clot of the size of a peach-stone, attached to the wall at the anterior portion near the septum; around this clot a more recent one had formed, its centre softened and granular. From this, probably, some small portions had been carried by the blood to the arteries in the base of the brain, doing their part in obstructing them and causing the fatal changes above described. The lining membrane of the heart, where the clot was attached, was much thickened, and the muscular layer at the same part very thin, near the apex not visible to the naked eye.

The lungs were adherent to the ribs on both sides of the chest—the evidence of old inflammations. The other organs were healthy.—New York Tribune, December 16, 1873.

A Good Hedge-Plant.—The Gardener's Monthly thinks that the white-thorn (Elæagnus parvifolius) complies with all the conditions of a good hedge-plant, much better than the Osage orange or any of the other plants employed for that purpose in this country. This plant does not grow more than a few inches high the first year from seed, and is then thornless; but there are large numbers of short branches from a quarter of an inch to two inches in length, and these become sharp spines the next year. The older the plants the spinier they become—an excellent feature in a hedge-plant. The second and third years branches are produced from three to five feet long, thus soon reaching a good height for a hedge. When the plants are massed together, they rarely show any disposition to exceed the height of six or eight feet. When they reach that height, they grow by sending strong shoots out from the stems near the ground; and thus the hedge is ever growing thicker—another excellent feature. If pruned, they make a first-class hedge; if totally neglected, they are still protective. Plants three or four years old seed, so that in a few years, with moderate encouragement, plants in abundance could be obtained.

Besides its protective value, the plant has a very beautiful appearance. The under side of the leaf, as well as the young growing branches, are silvery; and hence its common name. South of the Potomac it would probably be an evergreen. In Pennsylvania it holds its leaves to Christmas. The flowers are greenish white, not showy, but resemble in fragrance the English hawthorn. The berries which succeed are of a mottled red. The writer in the Gardener's Monthly is unable to determine what is the extreme degree of cold to which the plant may be exposed without injury. He states, however, that it has remained entirely uninjured in one. situation when