SMELL. 



703 



the information which he derived from it : 

 " There were some people whom he never 

 permitted to approach him, whilst others at 

 once excited his interest and attention. The 

 opinions which he formed of individuals, and 

 the means he employed to study their charac- 

 ter, were extremely interesting. In doing 

 this, lie appeared to be chiefly influenced by 

 the impressions communicated to him by his 

 sense of smell. When a stranger approached 

 him, he eagerly began to touch some part of 

 his body, commonly taking hold of the arm, 

 which he held near his nose, and after two or 

 three strong inspirations through the nostrils, 

 lie appeared to form a decided opinion regard- 

 ing him. If this was favourable, he showed 

 a disposition to become more intimate, ex- 

 amined more minutely his dress, and ex- 

 pressed by his countenance more or less satis- 

 faction ; but if it happened to be unfavourable, 

 he suddenly went off to a distance with ex- 

 pressions of carelessness or disgust. When 

 he was first brought to my house to have his 

 eyes examined, he both touched and smelled 

 several parts of my bod}- ; and the following 

 day, whenever he found me near him, he 

 grasped my arm, then smelled it, and imme- 

 diately recognised me, which he signified to 

 his father by touching his eyelids with the 

 fingers of both hands, and imitating the ex- 

 amination of his eyes which I had formerly 

 made." We learn from the same account, that 

 in selecting his food, he was always guided by 

 his sense of smell, for he never took anything 

 into his mouth without previously smelling it 

 carefully. He always recognised his own 

 clothes by their smell, and refused to wear 

 those which belonged to others. 



Sometimes the peculiar acuteness of this 

 sense is restricted to a particular odour or 

 class of odours, these usually proceeding from 

 objects for which there is either a special 

 fondness or a pnrticular aversion. Thus, a 

 gentleman blind from birth, who had an unac- 

 countable antipathy to cats, so that he could 

 never endure the presence of one in his apart- 

 ment, one day, when in company, suddenly 

 leaped up and exclaimed that a cat was in the 

 room, begging his friends to remove it. It was 

 in vain that, after careful inspection, they as- 

 sured him that he was under an illusion. He 

 persisted in his assertion, and his agitation con- 

 tinued ; and on the door of a small closet 

 being opened, it was found that a cat had been 

 accidentally shut up in it. 



With such unequivocal proofs of the acute- 

 ness of the sense of smell which may exist in 

 the human subject, the statements made re- 

 specting the extraordinary exaltation of the 

 faculty in various forms of somnambulism be- 

 come less incredible; and the author is fully 

 satisfied, from his own observations upon in- 

 dividuals hypnotised by Mr. Braid (see SLEKP ), 

 that this exaltation may certainly take place 

 in regard to the sense of smell. In one in- 

 stance, a glove being placed in the hand of 

 the hypnotised subject, he found out the 

 owner of it without difficulty, from amongst 

 more than sixty persons, scenting at each of 



them, one after another, until he came to the 

 right individual. And in another case, the 

 owner of a ring was in like manner unhesi- 

 tatingly found out from amongst a company of 

 twelve. 



The information conveyed by the sense of 

 smell is restricted to the quality and intensity 

 of the odour, and to some general notion of 

 its direction. This last, indeed, is rather de- 

 rived from a comparison of its relative inten- 

 sity when the face is turned towards different 

 sides, than from any more direct information 

 as to locality furnished by the organ itself. 

 The absence of any consciousness of the part 

 of the olfactory surface specially affected by 

 the impression, so that, unless the experiment 

 be made, we know not that we are constantly 

 exerting the sense on both sides, the double 

 sensation being perceived as a single one, is 

 attributed by Messrs. Todd and Bowman*, 

 with much probability, to the peculiar plexiform 

 arrangement of the fibres of the olfactive 

 nerve, and to the want of the isolation usually 

 effected between the fibres by the white sub- 

 stance of Schwann. 



Various classifications of odours, founded 

 upon the impressions which they make upon 

 the sense of smell, have been proposed ; but 

 they are all liable to the objection, that there 

 seems to be more of individual diversity in 

 regard to the character of olfactory impres- 

 sions, than with respect to those of any other 

 kind. Many odours, by some persons thought 

 intolerable, are very agreeable to others ; thus, 

 assafcetida is known amongst some by the 

 name of " devil's dung," whilst by others it is 

 spoken of as " food for the gods." It was 

 commonly employed by the ancients as a con- 

 diment; but the individuals who thus relish it 

 in our own country certainly constitute the 

 exceptions to the mass. So, again, thefumet 

 of game, so highly valued by the epicure, is 

 disagreeable to most persons who have not 

 been trained to appreciate it. On the other 

 hand, the aroma of certain flowers, which is 

 peculiarly agreeable to most persons, is by no 

 means so, or perhaps the reverse, to others. 

 Thus, Miiller remarks that the smell of mig- 

 nonette is to him only herb-like; whilst the 

 flower of Iris Persica has been pronounced to 

 be of pleasant odour by forty-one out of fifty- 

 four persons, by four to have little scent, by 

 eight to be without all odour, and by one to 

 be ill-scented.-f- 



It more frequently happens, in regard to 

 odours and savours, than with respect to 

 other sensory impressions, that habit renders 

 that agreeable, and even strongly relished, 

 which was at first highly repugnant. 



(W.S. Carpenter.) 



SOFTENING and INDURATION (Jta- 

 mollissement ct Induration, Endurchsement, 

 Fr., die Erweichung und Hartung, Germ.) are 

 terms used to express a pathological or phy- 

 siological diminution and increase, of the con- 

 sistence of the body or its parts. 



* Op. cit., p. 1 2. 



f Arnold's Physiology, V ol ii. p. .Mil. 



