VOL. XXVI.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 425 



quantity of light was admitted, than by the other parts; and it seemed that the 

 extreme parts of those cavities had exceedingly small orifices in them. On 

 viewing with a microscope that space of the tongue which is between the pro- 

 tuberances, it was ail over covered with abundance of exceedingly small rising 

 round particles, so close to each other, that you could not put in two hairs 

 between them. I stripped off also the surface of the tongue with a sharp knife, 

 and repeated the same a second time, and then discovered an unspeakable 

 number of small holes, some of which seemed to be filled, others were cut 

 through lengthwise. From this appearance I inferred, that when we press our 

 tongues against the roof of the mouth, in order to taste any thing, the said 

 long particles, the ends of which are exceedingly slender, press through the 

 uppermost skin, which at that place is also very thin, and endued with small 

 pores or holes, and so receives a little juice; from all which proceeds the kind 

 of sensation, which we call taste. Similar appearances, on examination, were 

 also observed in the tongues of hogs. 



I have often thought that our taste proceeds alone from the tongue, but 

 within these few days I am become of another opinion; for when I viewed that 

 part of the roof of the mouth, opposite to the top of the throat, where the 

 notched or jagged parts of the hog's tongue are determined, I judged that to 

 be the place from whence the head partly discharges itself, and the matter to 

 be cast out, which comes into the mouth without its proceeding from the lungs ; 

 as also that there are a great many parts in it, which receive the matter which 

 we call the taste: but this wants a further inquiry. 



Concerning the Migration of Birds. By the Rev. fVilliam Derham, F.R.S*^ 



N° 315, p. 123. 



What I would suggest concerning the migration of birds is, that the members 

 of the society would note down the very day they first see or hear of the ap- 

 proach of any of the migratory birds. And it may be convenient also to ob- 

 serve how the winds sit at the same time, especially towards the sea coasts. 

 The several observations ought to be communicated to the society. Which 

 when compared together, we may probably make a good guess which way those 

 birds come, whether from the east, or any other point. The jynx or wryneck, 

 for instance, which I take to be undoubtedly a bird of passage, I first heard 

 this year on March 29, the wind S. or S.W. that and the preceding day, but 

 E. before. The certhia also, or creeper, which leaves us in Essex till the spring, 

 but whether a bird of passage I cannot tell, this bird I saw first on March 23, 

 the winds that day varying from S. to N. but blowing strongly the day before 

 from W. Now if those birds in the more westerly, or any other parts, at 100, 



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