248 Observations and Experiments on the Sense of Taste. 



mouth, while the nose is stopped, a little lavender water, and 

 move the tongue about to the palate, &c. as you do when 

 tasting any thing ; you will have no taste, though you will 

 feel a heat on the tongue, such as you do in the stomach after 

 swallowing spirits; but if asked whether it might not be 

 brandy, gin, peppermint, noyau, that you had in your mouth, 

 you could not tell. Now breathe out through the mouth 

 as much as you can, still holding the nose, and at the 

 moment when you have breathed out to the utmost, set the 

 nose free; an inspiration will follow, which, if you pay atten- 

 tion, you may make to continue some time, during which, 

 even though you keep smacking in your mouth as before, 

 you will not taste the lavender water; but the instant the 

 breath turns and begins to pass out, the taste will come upon 

 you. My reason for stopping the nose in this case, before I 

 begin, instead of afterwards, is, because you will the easier re- 

 mark the moment at which the taste first comes upon you, 

 if you have not tasted the thing at all before ; for it will 

 make greater impression. Besides, by this means you may, 

 by shutting your eyes and letting another person put into 

 your mouth a liquor or substance which you have tasted in 

 your life before, but which they have now chosen without 

 telling you what it is, be quite sure that you did not taste it 

 before the breath began to rush outwards through the nose ; 

 since, as in this case, you will not have had the least know- 

 lege beforehand what it is you have in your mouth, it will be 

 impossible for you to imagine that you tasted it when in fact 

 you did not ; and it is the confusion arising from imagina- 

 tion, or association arising from previous knowledge, that we 

 are most to guard against in this matter. But it should be 

 something whose feel in the mouth is not decidedly different 

 from that of all other things, else you will know it by that ; 

 an aqueous fluid is therefore convenient. I chose lavender 

 water, because it happened to be at hand, but it is rather a good 

 subject for the experiment, because it has a decided taste, 

 and also a feel, which it has in common with many other 

 liquors (spirits) from which it yet decidedly differs in taste. 

 I tried it next with sal volatile ; but it answers with every 

 thing I have tried ; and I also observed, that, in common 



