44 - TRICHOLOGIA MAMMALIUM; 
together and appear to be grey to the unassisted vision. Figure 50 e shows some of these 
dispositions of the coloring matter: a, the Mouse; b, the Pouched Rat of Kentucky ; ¢, the 
Otter; d, the Irish Ermine; e, the Ermine. 
Or THE CoLorinG Marrer or Pite.—Prof. Robert Hare remarks that ‘“ None of the 
operations of nature are more inscrutable, than those by which organic substances are 
endowed with the immense variety of colors with which vegetables and animals are 
adorned. ‘The chemist,” he says, ‘may know how to elaborate dyes. to fix them, by the 
interposition of mordants, to vary their hues; but. excepting the influence of transparent 
media, or crystalline structure, in dispersing refracted or polarized rays, he is still quite 
ignorant of the differences in the arrangement of particles which give rise to dzversity of 
color, or the mode in which chemical combinations cause the various colors of the precipi- 
tates.” (Compen. 419.) Moreover, Raspail informs us, that ‘The coloring matter of 
vegetables, (which acts such a prominent part in their organization,) has been classed, 
sometimes, among fatfy matters ; but that it is, in fact, a@ variety of wax.” (New Syst. of 
Org. Chem., p. 462.) Henle still considers the coloring matter of pile as @ fat. This 
learned philosopher, after deploring that we do not possess a better analysis of hair, in 
which regard should be paid to the three substances which compose its stalk, adds that, 
“ According to those we possess, hair is a combination of fat and a horny substance ; the 
first belonging to the centre, and the last to the cortex and intermediate substance. The 
fat,” he says, ‘may be extracted by boiling the hair in alcohol; that it is, ordinarily, 
acids, viz: the margaric and the oléic.’”’ It has, (he avers,) a blood-red tinge in red hair, 
greenish grey in brown hair, and, (according to Jahns, Der. Haarcortz, t. 1., p. 49,) white 
hair hasa limprd oil. He concludes that after the extraction of the fat, brown hair becomes 
greenish yellow. LL ’Heritier analyzed the hair of an albino, and found that it contains a 
colorless liquid and a solid white fat. (Traité. de Chem. Path., 616.) 
It would seem from the foregoing quotations, that this portion of our subject is fraught 
with intrinsic difficulties. Commencing under such unfavorable circumstances, shall we 
be able to trace this wxknown to so small a particle of matter as the coloring of a hair. 
The names given to coloring matter are ‘‘Chromule and Chlorophyl.” In vegetables 
the prevailing color is green. and a combination of the db/ack oxide of manganese and 
potash, (which is whte,) gives to water a green color. Now manganese and iron both 
enter into the composition of pile; so that if hair was green, we would experience little 
difficulty in attributing its color to the iron and manganese. But the green color imparted 
to water by the manganese and potash, passes gradually through all the shades of the 
prism, and eventually becomes colorless after throwing down the black oxide ; which shows 
that the manganese may enter into the basis of the coloring matter of pile, notwithstand- 
ing zt is not yreen. How is it in regard to plants? Their chlorophyl, (or coloring matter,) 
although it imparts to the /eaves, a green color, furnishes to the /lowers, all those various 
tints, which, in those beautiful objects, so much delight the eye; and even in the leaves, 
the green color, at certain seasons, or under peculiar circumstances, turn yelliw, red and 
brown, the very colors found in hair. So Berzelius mentions two substances which color 
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