-406 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



Of the Sen Je of Smelling. 



The pleafures of fmell are peculiar tti Mari'j 

 for I do not comprehend under it the olfactory 

 emanations by which he forms a judgment of his 

 aliments, and which are common to him with mod 

 animals. Man alone is fenfible to perfumes, and 

 employs them to give more energy to his paflions. 

 Mahomet faid, that they elevated his foul to Heaven. 

 Whatever may be in this, the ufe of them has been 

 introduced into all the religious ceremonies, and 

 into the political alTemblies,of many Nations. The 

 BraMlians, as well as all the Savages of Norths 

 America, never deliberate on any object of im- 

 portance, without fmoking tobacco in a calumet. 

 Jt is from this practice that the calumet is become, 

 among all thofe Nations, the fymbol of peace, of 

 war, of alliance, according to the accefibries with 

 "which it is accompanied. 



It is, undoubedly, from the fame cuftom of 

 fmoking, which was common to the Scythians, as 

 Herodotus relates, that the caduceus of Mercury^ 

 which has a linking refemblance to the calumet 

 of the Americans, and which appears, like it, to 

 have been nothing but a pipe, became the fymbol 

 of commerce. Tobacco increafes, in fome mea- 



fure. 



