352 THE SENSORIAL FUNCTIONS. 



Chapter III. 



TASTE. 



The senses of Taste and Smell are intended to 

 convey impressions resulting from the chemical 

 qualities of bodies, the one in the fluid, the other 

 in the gaseous state.* There is a considerable 

 analogy between the sensations derived from these 

 two senses. The organ of taste is the surface of 

 the tongue, the skin of which is furnished with a 

 large proportion of blood-vessels and nerves. The 

 vascular plexus immediately covering the corium 

 is here very visible, and forms a distinct layer, 

 through which a great number of papillae pass, and 

 project from the surface, covered with a thin cuticle, 

 like the pile of velvet. In the fore part of the 

 human tongue these papillae are visible even to the 

 naked eye ; and especially in certain morbid con- 

 ditions of the organ. t They are of different kinds ; 

 but it is only those which are of a conical shape 

 that are the seat of taste. If these papillae be 



* Bellini contended that the different flavours of saline bodies are 

 owing to the peculiar figures of their crystalline particles. It is 

 strange that Dumas should have thought it worth while seriously to 

 combat this extravagant hypothesis, by a laboured refutation. 



t This is particularly the case in scarlatina, in the early stage of 

 which disease they are elongated, and become of a bright red colour, 

 from their minute blood-vessels being distended with blood. As the 

 fever subsides the points of the papillae collapse, and acquire a brown 

 hue ; giving rise to the appearance known by the name of the straw- 

 berry tongue. 



