Electro-physiology and electro-therapeutics : showing the best methods for the medical uses of electricity / By Alfred C. Garratt.
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upper and back portions of the hip. The main trunk of the mus- culo-cutaneous then winds along the crest of the ilium between the transversalis and the internal oblique, and at this point it divides into two branches — the abdominal and the scrotal. The abdominal branch runs forward parallel with the last dorsal or intercostal nerve, to near the rectus muscle, and supplying the muscles in its course, it then is distributed finally in the integ- ument of the mom pubis and the folds of the groin. The scrotal branch, after communicating with the inferior musculocutaneous nerve, passes forward to the abdominal ring. It then pierces the cremaster muscle, and accompanies the spermatic cord in the male, and the round ligament in the female, to be distrib- uted to the integument of the scrotum or the external labium. Such is the distribution of the ilio-scrotal nerve. The other musculocutaneous nerve, viz., the ilio-inguinal, passes at first obliquely across the quadratus lumborum, below the former nerve, to the anterior superior spinous process of the ilium, rest- ing in its course upon the iliac fascia; but here it pierces the fascia and muscle of the transversalis outwards, and connecting with the scrotal branch of the ilio-scrotal nerve, it passes along the spermatic canal with the spermatic cord, to be distributed with it. The genito-crural nerve proceeds mostly from the second lum- bar, and passes downward and forward on the psoas muscle to Poupart's ligament, and divides there into two main branches — the genital and the crural. The genital branch (spermaticus sen pudendus externus) arrives at the internal abdominal ring, and descends along the spermatic canal, lying behind the cord to the scrotum, where it branches off to supply the spermatic cord and cremaster muscle in the male, and the round ligament and external labium in the female. Tims the scrotal branch of the musculo-cutaneous nerve and the genital branch of the genito-crural nerve together supply those important parts. At the abdominal ring, the genital branch sends off a large twig to the integument of the groin. The crural branch of the genito-crural goes to the thigh, and will there be considered. We now come to the last six of the thirty-one pairs of spinal