322 



THE POPULAR EDUCATOR. 



while the other branch of the sense of taste is feeble. That 

 which wo call ravenous hunger in a dog or lion, is not the un- 

 easy feeling of privation, which wo associate with excessive 

 hunger, but is an all-engrossing desire to gratify the sense of 

 taste, and this ia altogether distinct from a dainty apprecia- 

 tion of flavour. 



These animals can endure privation from food for considerable 

 periods without manifesting any signs of starvation ; but the 

 smell, sight, and, most of all, the partial taste of flesh, excite 

 them to eager, and even ferocious craving. Hence the popular 

 notion of the dangerous nature of wild beasts which have once 

 tasted blood is a true one. On the other hand, when the food 

 is once obtained, it is torn to pieces, flung to the back of the 

 mouth, and swallowed with a rapidity which altogether forbids 

 the idea that these animals possess to any extent the faculty of 

 discrimination in their tastes. 



This view of the question is also borne out by an inspection 

 of the tongue. In the illustration, the reader will find a repre- 

 sentation of a cat's tongue. This tongue is long, and has but 

 f ow round papillae ; but it is covered with a dense pile of long, 

 thin, pointed, overlapping projections (filiform papillos), which 

 are directed backwards, and towards the mid line. The cir- 

 cumvallate papillae, again, are but four in number, two on each 

 side. It is this pile of pointed papillae which makes the cat's 

 tongue feel rough when she licks. The covering of these 

 papillae is so dense, hard, and thick, when compared with that 

 of our own, that wo are justified in thinking them mechanical 

 only in function ; and yet they cover the whole tongue almost 

 to the exclusion of the other kinds. 



In the larger members of the cat family, these pointed papillae 

 are quite like hard thorns or spines ; and with them the lion, 

 tiger, and leopard can rasp away the last adhering fragments of 

 flesh and ligament from the bones. A patch of these papillae 

 from the leopard's tongue are represented in the engraving. 

 They are two-lobed and rounded, and have from their back part 

 a single sharp s"pine running directly backward, and they are set 

 in a very regular pattern, alternating in each row. On the 

 summit of the leopard's tongue a number of papillae were found 

 without spines, as though worn off, or perhaps not developed, 

 lest the palate should be injured by them. 



In illustration of those remarks we may give an incident. A 

 gentleman had reared a tame leopard from a cub, and havin 

 always fed it on bread, etc., the animal was very docile, and 

 showed no sign of savageness. It was often caressed by its 

 master, and returned the blandishments after its manner. 

 While thus engaged, it one day took its master's hand into its 

 mouth, and began to lick it gently, but owing to the roughness 

 of the tongue it caused some blood to flow. The gentleman, no 

 doubt feeling some pain, tried to withdraw his hand, but, to his 

 surprise, the beast for the first time in its life began to growl. 

 With great presence of mind the gentleman relented from his 

 effort to release his hand, rang the bell, asked his servant for 

 his loaded pistol, and then shot his now dangerous favourite 

 through the head. 



'In herbivorous animals, while the sense is far less keen, so far 

 as the alimentary sensation is concerned, we have no reason to 

 suppose that the distinguishing gustatory sense is in any degree 

 stronger. 



The c.ain mass of the food of the ruminants is insipid. 

 Freshness is the strongest term that can be used to express its 

 desirability. A large bulk is required for but a little nutriment. 

 Thus we find the ox occupies a considerable number of its 

 wakeful hours in grazing and chewing, and it feeds along the 

 pasture, tearing up the grass. with but little discrimination'. It 

 is true that a cow will avoid noxious or disagreeable plant; 

 when they grow in clumps ; for a field, otherwise closely cropped, 

 still presents long stalks of the common buttercup. It would 

 seem, however, that this avoidance is rather due to instinct than to 

 disgust. Many plants have very powerful, bitter, sour, and astrin- 

 gent principles, and they are intimately mingled with the grass ; 

 yet, as we seldom see a cow eject the food from its mouth, we 

 cannot suppose it to have any very delicate sense of taste. 

 From the fact that oxen ruminate, we might suppose that they 

 enjoy the sense of taste while chewing the cud. So doubtless 

 they do in a minor degree ; but the act by which the food i: 

 returned to the mouth is probably quite involuntary ; and the 

 lazy, dreamy way in which an ox ruminates contrasts strongly 

 With the avidity with which a carnivorous animal feeda. 



The tongue of a ruminant is very long and flexible. II is 

 often twisted round the herbage to tear it up, or break it off; 

 and the qualities which fit it for this use are manifested in the 

 lighest degree in the tongue of the camelopard. This animal 

 an extend by the length of this member its already great 

 >owers of reaching high, and thus hook down the branches of 

 ;he palm. Well might this animal suggest to Lamarck that ita 

 whole organism had been modified by a constant endeavour t 

 reach higher and higher. 



The position of the large walled-round papillae ia very various 

 n different animals. The reader will have observed their posi- 

 tion in the chimpanzee, in one long lino of about twelve in 

 number down the middle of the tongue, with a few scattered 

 ones on each side. In the pig, otter, and seal they have the 

 V-shaped arrangement which they have in man, but are fewer in 

 number. In the sheep they form a thick, raised ridge on each 

 side at the back of the tongue. 



One of the most singular uses to which the tongue is put in. 

 this class is manifested by the ant-eaters, whose long slimy 

 tongues are used to thrust into ants' nests, so that when they 

 are retracted into their long tubular mouths the ants are carried 

 with them, adhering to the mucus. 



If this article had been headed "The Tongue," instead of 

 " The Organ of Taste," we should have a long task before us to 

 describe the various shapes of the organ in toads and reptiles, 

 and also in snails and insects. The organ to which the word 

 tongue has been applied has a wonderful diversity of form, and 

 many interesting peculiarities ; but in most cases its main office 

 is to seize or to masticate the food, and the function of taste is 

 subordinate to this. 



In birds the tongue is almost as diversified in form as the 

 beak ; but it is usually cased in horn at its fore part, and there 

 are only a few papillae above the air-hole. In parrots it is- 

 fieshy ; and these birds seem to have more of the sense of taste 

 than most birds, for they will turn a lump of sugar or a nut 

 about in their beaks for some time to test its qualities before 

 eating it. It is certainly singular that birds, whose proper food 

 is fruit, should be so little endowed with a sense to appreciate 

 its delightful and delicate flavour; nevertheless, it seems as 

 though the tongue were only applied to test the softness, and 

 therefore the ripeness of the fruit. The tongue drawn to repre- 

 sent that of the fieldfare, may be taken as the typical tongue of 

 a bird. The small triangular tongue of the ostrich, supported 

 on its slender arch of bone, is given because- of its singular 

 shape and shortness. The length of the tongue has but little 

 relation to the length of the beak. Thus both the pelioan and 

 the toucan have enormous beaks ; but the former has a tongue 

 as short as that of the ostrich, while that of the latter is very 

 long. The tongue of the woodpecker is a living harpoon. 



In some reptiles there is evidence of a sense of taste, but it is 

 doubtless inferior to that of higher animals. The tongue of the 

 chameleon, given in the engraving, is of curious shape; and the 

 mechanism by which it can be darted upon a luckless fly is elabo- 

 rate and interesting ; but its description would be out of place 

 here. In the toad and frog the tongue grows as the tail drops 

 off. It sprouts from the inside of the lower jaw, and grows 

 backward, so that its bi-lobed end lies free in the mouth, and 

 can be filliped forward out of that cavity. This is also rather 

 an organ of prehension than of taste. The forked tongue of the 

 snake is familiar to every one. Its reiterated protrusion and 

 vibration has led the vulgar to consider this action as a threat, 

 and to believe that it is the sting of the animal. It, however, 

 has no such function. It may have some power of tasting, but 

 it is more probable that it is an organ of touch; for this creature, 

 limbless and covered with hard scales, is greatly in need of a 

 means of feeling outward objects. 



Fishes' tongues have seldom any soft parts, and cannot there- 

 fore be organs of taste. They are not unfrequently furnished, 

 with teeth. In some fish a cushion of soft substance, well 

 supplied with blood-vessels, is found on the roof of the mouth. 



All the higher orders of mollusca hr/re an organ to which the 

 name of tongue has been given, and some authors have proposed 

 to group together the head-walkers, belly-walkers, and wing- 

 footed classes under one sub-division, calling them odontophora, 

 or animals which have a tooth-bearing tongue. This organ ir. 

 snails (gasteropods) bears transverse rows of teeth arranged in 

 complicated and beautiful patterns, and is sometimes so long ae 

 to be called the lingual ribbon. As Jt is oftea used to fiie^away 



