Embryological Sketch.—The brain is a sort of pons asinorum in anatomy until one gets a certain general conception of it as a clue. Then it becomes a comparatively simple affair. The clue is given by comparative anatomy and especially by embryology. At a certain moment in the development of all the higher vertebrates the cerebro-spinal axis is formed by a hollow tube containing fluid and terminated in front by an enlargement separated by transverse constrictions into three 'cerebral vesicles,' so called (see [Fig. 28]). The walls of these vesicles thicken in most places, change in others into a thin vascular tissue, and in others again send out processes which produce an appearance of farther subdivision. The middle vesicle or mid-brain (Mb in the figures) is the least affected by change. Its upper walls thicken into the optic lobes, or corpora quadrigemina as they are named in man; its lower walls become the so-called peduncles or crura of the brain; and its cavity dwindles into the aqueduct of Silvius. A section through the adult human mid-brain is shown in [Fig. 31.]
Fig. 31.—The 'nates' are the anterior corpora quadrigemina, the spot above aq is a section of the sylvian aqueduct, and the tegmentum and two 'feet' together make the Crura. These are marked C.C., and a cross (+) marks the aqueduct, in [Fig. 32.]
Fig. 32 (after Huxley).
The anterior and posterior vesicles undergo much more considerable change. The walls of the posterior vesicle thicken enormously in their foremost portion and form the cerebellum on top (Cb in all the figures) and the pons Varolii below (P.V. in [Fig. 33]). In its hindmost portions the posterior vesicle thickens below into the medulla oblongata (Mo in all the figures), whilst on top its walls thin out and melt, so that one can pass a probe into the cavity without breaking through any truly nervous tissue. The cavity which one thus enters from without is named the fourth ventricle (4 in Figs. [32] and [33]). One can run the probe forward through it, passing first under the cerebellum and then under a thin sheet of nervous tissue (the valve of Vieussens) just anterior thereto, as far as the aqueduct of Silvius. Passing through this, the probe emerges forward into what was once the cavity of the anterior vesicle. But the covering has melted away at this place, and the cavity now forms a deep compressed pit or groove between the two walls of the vesicle, and is called the third ventricle (3 in Figs. [32] and [33]). The 'aqueduct of Sylvius' is in consequence of this connection often called the iter a tertio ad quartum ventriculum. The walls of the vesicle form the optic thalami (Th in all the figures).