Biceps Cubiti ([Fig. 68], 21; [Fig. 72], 10, 11).—This muscle, also called the long flexor of the forearm, does not merit the name except by its analogy with the corresponding muscle in man. Indeed, in the domestic animals it is not divided into two parts; it is represented by a single fasciculus, long and fusiform, situated on the front of the humerus, and directed obliquely downwards and backwards, as the latter, on its part, is also inclined.
It arises above from a tubercle at the base of the coracoid process, which surmounts the glenoid cavity of the scapula. Its tendon, which is highly developed in the solipeds, occupies the bicipital groove. We remember that in these latter the groove in question is divided into two channels by a median prominence.
The tendon in which the muscle ends is inserted into a tuberosity, situated on the internal surface of the superior extremity of the radius—the bicipital tuberosity. In the pig, the cat, and the dog, there is detached from the tendon to which we have just referred a fasciculus of the same nature, which, after having wound round the radius, is inserted into the internal surface of the ulna, towards the base of the olecranon process. From the inferior part of the muscle arises a fibrous band, comparable to the aponeurotic expansion of the human biceps; but, instead of passing downwards and inwards, as does the latter, it terminates on the muscular mass which constitutes the antero-external part of the forearm.
The biceps is not seen in the superficial layer, except in the dog and cat (in which the humerus is, in fact, proportionately long); and even in them only to the slightest extent. It is covered partly in these latter, and completely in other animals, by the great pectoral and the inferior portion of the mastoido-humeral—that is to say, that part of the latter which represents the whole of the clavicular fibres of the human deltoid.
The biceps is a flexor of the forearm on the arm. It also contributes to the movement of extension of the humerus.
Brachialis Anticus ([Fig. 68], 22; [Fig. 69], 19; [Fig. 70], 27; [Fig. 72], 12).—In veterinary anatomy further designated as the short flexor of the forearm, this muscle, which is thick, occupies the musculo-spiral groove, and arises from it, reaching upwards to just below the head of the humerus. But it does not, as in man, extend to the internal surface of the bone.
Situated on the outside of the biceps, it is directed towards the forearm, and terminates by a flattened tendon, which, dividing into two slips, passes below the bicipital tuberosity, on the internal surface of the radius, into which one of these slips is inserted, while the other proceeds to terminate on the ulna.
The inferior half of this muscle is visible on the superficial layer, in the space limited posteriorly by the triceps brachialis, and below by the muscles of the forearm, which correspond to the external muscles of the human forearm, and in front by the great pectoral and the mastoido-humeral. It is in the upper part of the interspace which separates these latter from the brachialis anticus that the deltoid insinuates itself to proceed to its insertion into the humerus.
These relations precisely recall those which we meet with when we examine the external surface of the human arm, with this difference, however—that in the latter the anterior brachialis anticus is extensively related, in front, to the biceps. However, in animals it is not absolutely the same, since, as we have shown above, the biceps is covered, more or less completely, by the mastoido-humeral and the great pectoral.
The brachialis anticus flexes the forearm on the arm.