THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



177 



plant from some distant shore, of which 

 not one of its ever so remote ancestry 

 could have had any knowledge, is 

 brought within its range of wing ; its 

 flight is unhesitatingly directed to it, 

 and its precious burden of eggs, without 

 a shadow of mistrust, is at once com- 

 mitted to its leaves. Such knowledge 

 has never been attained by our most 

 distinguished botanists, and it is beyond 

 the scope of human intellect. We 

 have called its displays instinct — a 

 word conveniently framed to cover 

 manifestations in other classes of ani- 

 mated beings, which we are utterly 

 unable to explain. As a partial ex- 

 planation of these wonders, it has been 

 suggested that to the insect world may 

 have been given senses differing in 

 number and in kind from those which 

 we possess. But all the wonderful 

 phenomena attendant upon insect ovi- 

 position by selection is readily explain- 

 ed under the supposition that it is 

 guided and controlled by the sense of 

 smell. We know the value of this 

 important sense to us, how greatly it 

 may minister to our pleasure, and what 

 service it may render in guarding us 

 from deleterious exhalations and from 

 improper food. It is capable of culti- 

 vation to the extent of rendering us 

 still greater service. I have been told 

 of a chemist in one of our colleges who 

 can make quite a correct qualitative 

 analysis of a patent nostrum hy apply- 

 ing it to his nose, and picking out one 

 after another of the ingredients, first 

 naming those which are simply added 

 as covers. It is related of a blind per- 

 son that he acquired the faculty of re- 

 cognizing his acquaintances by the 

 sense of smell. There are negroes in 

 Africa who will follow their mastei-s 

 by scent. A fish dealer in Albany 

 claims the ability of naining each spe- 

 cies of tish offered in the market, when 

 presented to him blindfolded, by the 

 odor peculiar to each. The illustra- 



tions given us of the acuteness of this 

 sense, in some of our domestic animals, 

 are so numerous as not to need cita- 

 tion. We will quote a single instance 

 of this almost miraculous acuteness, 

 related upon undoubted authority : — 

 " A person, to make trial whetlier a 

 young blood-hound was well tniined, 

 caused one of his servants to walk to a 

 town four miles distant, and then to a 

 market-town three miles further. The 

 dog, without having seen the man he 

 was to pursue, followed him by the 

 scent to the above mentioned places, 

 notwithstanding the multitude of mar- 

 ket people that went along the same 

 way, and of travellers that had occa- 

 sion to cross it ; and when the blood- 

 hound came to the chief market-town, 

 he passed through the streets without 

 taking any notice of any of the people 

 there, and left not till he had gone to 

 the house where the man he sought 

 rested himself, and found him in an 

 upper room, to the wonder of those 

 that followed him." 



That insects are controlled by this 

 same sense may seem a bold supposi- 

 tion to those of you who may happen 

 to know, or who may leara now Irom 

 the confession that I am compelled to 

 make, that notwithstanding the labo- 

 rious investigations in insect structure, 

 conducted through a century by some 

 of our most distiuguished scientists, we 

 are utterly unable to point out with 

 positive certainty the precise location 

 and nature of the organs of smell. Na- 

 turalists have differed, and still differ, 

 in their views in regard to their loca- 

 tion. Cuvier, Audouin, Dumeril and 

 Burmeister, have regarded the spiracles 

 or breathing pores as discharging this 

 office. Reaumer, Lyonnet, Luitreille, 

 and others, have referred it to the an- 

 tennie. Others have believed that the 

 palpi were th(^ true smelling organs, 

 and others that the sense belonged to 

 certain cavities in the front part of the 



