ACUTENESS OF TASTE. 157 



it rapidly around that cavity, and eject it. A portion, irr this way, 

 comes in contact with every part of the membrane; and of course im- 

 presses not only the lingual, but the other ramifications of the fifth pair. 



The gourmet of the French somewhat more elevated in the scale 

 than our ordinary epicure prides himself upon his discrimination of 

 the nicest shades of difference and excellence in the materials set before 

 him. Many gourmets profess to be able to pronounce, by sipping a 

 few drops of wine, the country whence it comes, and its age; and, 

 according to Stelluti, can tell, by the taste, whether birds put upon the 

 table are domesticated or wild, male or female. 1 Dr. Kitchener 2 

 asserts, that many epicures are capable of saying in what precise reach 

 or stretch of the Thames the salmon on the table has been caught, and 

 Sir Astley Cooper was in the habit of relating the remarkable case of 

 a professional friend, who could discriminate by the taste the beef fur- 

 nished by a particular London butcher. 3 



This acuteness of sense is by no means desirable. Doomed to meet, 

 in his progress through life, with such a preponderance of what demands 

 obtuseness rather than acuteness of feeling, the epicure must be liable 

 to continual annoyances and discomforts, which the less favoured can 

 never experience. 



In disease, gustation often becomes greatly depraved ; and the various 

 morbid tastes have been accounted for by depraved secretions in the 

 mouth, acting as foreign sapid substances on the papillae. Certain 

 tastes, however, cannot be explained in this way, and must be regarded 

 as nervous phenomena. If the epithelium be covered with a fur, taste 

 may be lost or impaired, and be instantaneously restored as soon as the 

 coating is removed. M. Magendie observed, that dogs, after the injec- 

 tion of milk into their veins, licked their lips, and gave other evidences 

 of tasting. When Dr. E. Hale, in an experiment referred to in another 

 part of this work, injected castor oil into one of his veins, he distinctly 

 tasted the oil a short time afterwards. Messrs. Todd and Bowman 4 

 suggest that such phenomena, if uniformly present, might be occasioned 

 by the transudation of the fluid from the vessels to the nerves of the 

 papillae ; and this may be the true explanation, although it is not easy 

 to see that such transudation could occur in the case of castor oil. 



SENSE OF SMELL OR OLFACTION. 



The object of this sense is to appreciate the odorous properties of 

 bodies. It differs from the last in the circumstance that the body does 

 not come into immediate contact. It is only necessary that an odorous 

 emanation from it shall impinge upon the organ of sense. Still, it 

 does not essentially vary in its physiology from the sense of taste. 



1. ANATOMY OF THE ORGAN OF SMELL. 



The organ of smell is a mucous membrane, which lines the nasal 

 cavities, and is called Schneiderian or pituitary. It resembles that 

 which covers the organ of taste, except that the nervous papillae are 

 more delicate, to correspond with the greater tenuity of the body that 



1 American Quarterly Review, ii. 427. 2 Cook's Oracle, 3d edit., p. 229, Lond., 1821. 



3 Life of Sir Astley Cooper, Bart., by Bransby Blake Cooper, Esq., F. R. S., ii. 137, Lond., 1843. 



4 The Physiological Anatomy and Physiology of Man, p. 448, Lond., 1845. 



