he lower border of the
transverse and oblique muscles. In a dissection so conducted, the cord
is made to assume the variable positions which anatomists report it to
have in respect to the neighbouring muscles. But when we view nature as
she is, and not as fashioned by the scalpel, we never fail to find an
easy explanation of her form.

In the foetus, prior to the descent of the testicle, the cremaster
muscle does not exist. (Cloquet, op cit.) From this we infer, that those
parts of the muscles, E F, Plate 30, which at a subsequent period are
converted into a cremaster, entirely occupy the space L h. In the adult
body, where one of the testicles has been arrested in the inguinal
canal, the muscles, E F, do not present a defined arched margin, above
the vacant space L h, but are continued (as in the foetus) as low down
as the external abdominal ring. In the adult, where the testicle has
descended to the scrotum, the cremaster exists, and is serially
continuous with the muscles, E F, covering the space L h; the meaning of
which is, that the cremasteric parts of the muscles, E F, cover this
space. The name cremaster therefore must not cancel the fact that the
fibres so named are parts of the muscles, E F. Again, in the female
devoid of a cremaster, the muscles, E F, present of their full
quantities, having sustained no diminution of their bulk by the
formation of a cremaster. But when an external inguinal hernia occurs in
the female body, the bowel during its descent carries before it a
cremasteric covering at the expense of the muscles E F, just in the same
way as the testicle does in the foetus. (Cloquet.)

From the above-mentioned facts, viewed comparatively, it seems that the
following inferences may be legitimately drawn:--1st, that the space L h
does not naturally exist devoid of a muscular covering; for, in fact,
the cremaster overlies this situation; 2nd, that the name cremaster is
one given to the lower fibres of the internal oblique and transverse
muscles which cover this space; and 3rd, that to separate the
cremasteric elongation of these muscles, and then describe them as
presenting a defined arched margin, an inch or two above Poupart's
ligament, is an act as arbitrary on the part of the dissector as if he
were to subdivide these muscles still more, and, while regarding the
subdivisions as different structures, to give them names of different
signification. When once we consent to regard the cremaster as
cons