100 



times comj^ared with tliat needed in the absence of sugar; 4.034 grams of 

 salt was ahont as effective as 0.8 grams of sugar. In other words, if the 

 mind is intent on noticing sourness, even large quantities of sugar do not 

 seriously interfei'e. In the usual eating of sweet and sour food, hosvever, 

 tlie miiid is, as it were, engrossed with the sensation of sweetness aud ren- 

 dered correspondingly less sensitive to other tastes. 



In al! probability any other jfowerful taste would be as effective in hid- 

 ing sourness as sweetness is, but no other taste in concentrated form is so 

 generally agreeable as sweetness. The sourness of lemonade would cer- 

 tainly be as thoroughly masked by highly salting it as by the addition of 

 sugar; the I'esult would not, however, be as agreeable to the majority of 

 lemonade drinkers, probably. 



In conclusion, brief refeience might be made to a few experiments ou 

 the effect of sugar on bitterness, as sweetness and bitterness are commonly 

 considered to be mutually exclusive terms — a thing can not be both sweet 

 and bitter, though it can be at once sweet and sour. The experiments were 

 made by the writer a\ ith mixtures of solutions of sugar and of quinine, but 

 it was found im])ossibie to obtain any numerical results, for, no matter 

 what the proportion within very wide limits, the sensation of sweetness 

 preceded that of bitterness, the mixture tasting sweet at the first moment 

 and then bitter, the latter sensation being very lasting. 



The use of sugar, then, to render sourness less intense, is based on a 

 physiological, not on any chemical effect ; the nerves of taste are less sen- 

 sitive to one kind of taste in the presence of another, though the mind by 

 concentration can largely overcome this obscuring effect. 



