Treatise Upon the Genesis and Development of the Dental Follicles to the Epoch of the Eruption of the Teeth. [Volume: 2, Issue: 11, June, 1861, pp. 587-601]

GENESIS AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE DENTAL FOLLICLES. 589

nuclei of the surrounding laminated tissue, but without nucleoli. This
tissue then contains only nuclei-they are very close to each other without
being contiguous, because a small quantity of slightly-granulated amorphous matter lies between them. This amorphous matter is so resistant
that it gives to the entire bulb, and to the fragments of its tissue, a cer.
tain consistency which it is difficult to destroy, and also an elasticity which
makes it slip between the plates of glass when it is a little compressed.
This, added to the nearness of the nuclei constituting the tissue, gives it
an appearance which is altogether peculiar.
The amorphous matter extends about lh of a millimetre beyond the
most superficial nuclei at the periphery of the bulb, and exhibits no
molecular granulations, or only very few in comparison to that which is
interposed between the nuclei.
At this time no cell of ivory exists at the surface of the bulb in the thin
bed of amorphous substance. The surface of the latter can be torn as
cleanly as the rest of its depth in the yet fresh nascent bulbs. But gradually, even before the cells of the ivory originate, the surface of this amorphous matter becomes denser than the subjacent part, commencing at the
summit of the bulb, and it is easily corrugated.* When the tissue of the
bulb is torn, this superficial bed detaches itself from the subjacent portion
in extremely transparent strips, without granulations or strim, so thin that
two lines more than measure its depth.
This bed or membrane folds with the greatest facility and is readily
detached, but irregularly, by tearing, when the bulb begins to be affected
by the cadaveric changes., We will see hereafter that it ceases to exist at
the point of junction between the base of the bulb and the follicular wall,
when, instead of the nuclei of the former, we find laminated fibres at the
base and in the wall, forming the inner surface of the wall as well as its
thickness.
~6. Of the Organ of the Enamel in particular.-We are already
aware that a very short time after the wall of the follicle reunites in a
closed cavity, there originates between the inner face of the wall and the
surface of the bulb, a thin gelatiniform bed, composed of star-studded
fibro-plastic bodies, which are ramified and anastomosed. This membrane
is the organ of the enamel, which soon exhibits on its deep or bulbular
surface the continuous range of the cells of the enamel; these are pris* Raschkow has given the name of membrana prseformativa dentis (1885) to the
superficial bed of the bulb. He has also noticed that the tissue of the latter is distinguished from the tissue of the organ of the enamel by the granules which compose it, and later by its nerves and vessels. The bulb, which is vascular before the
appearance of the dental cells, does not at this time contain nerves-these vessels
and nerves we will hereafter describe. The thin membrane, of a cellular nature,
proper to it, described by M. Oudet (loc. cit. 1835, aft. Dent., p. 98,) cannot be seen
on the surface of the pulp, unless the organ of the enamel is the matter in question.