Chap. XVIII. ODOUES EMITTED. 279 



Odour. — With some animals, as with the notorious 

 skunk of America, the overwhelming odour which they 

 emit appears to serve exchisively as a means of defence. 

 With shrew-mice (Sorex) both sexes possess abdominal 

 scent-glands, and there can be little doubt, from the 

 manner in which their bodies are rejected by birds and 

 beasts of prey, that their odour is protective ; never- 

 theless the glands become enlarged in the males during 

 the breeding-season. In many quadrupeds the glands 

 are of the same size in both sexes ; ^ but their use is 

 not known. In other species the glands are confined 

 to tlie males, or are more developed in them tlian in 

 the females ; and they almost always become more 

 active during the rutting-season. At this period the 

 glands on the sides of the face of the male elephant 

 enlaro-e and emit a secretion havino: a strons^ muskv 

 odour. 



The rank effluvium of the male goat is well known, 

 and that of certain male deer is wonderfully strong 

 and persistent. On the banks of the Plata I have per- 

 ceived the whole air tainted with the odour of the male 

 Cervus camjjestris, at the distance of half a mile to 

 leeward of a herd ; and a silk handkerchief, in which I 

 carried home a skin, though repeatedly used and washed, 

 retained, when first unfolded, traces of the odour for 

 one year and seven months. This animal does not emit 

 its strong odour until more than a year old, and if cas- 



auimal. The fullest account is given by Mr. Brown, who doubts about 

 the rudimentary condition of the bladder in the female, in ' Proc. 

 Zoolog. Soc' 1868, p. 435. 



9 As with the castoreum of the beaver, see Mr. L. H. Morgan's 

 most interesting work, 'Tlie American Beaver,' 1868, p. 300. Pallas 

 (' Spic. Zoolog.' fasc. viii. 1779, p. 2;-5) has well discussed the odoriferous 

 glands of mammals. Owen (' Anat. of Vertebrates,' vol. iii. p. 634) 

 also gives an account of these glands, including those of the elephant, 

 and (p. 763) those of shrew-mice. 



