154 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 
and see if we can explain the sensations of smell, taste and touch by use of 
molecular movements. 
The story is oft recited in our books of Natural Philosophy, under the head 
of the wonderful divisibility of matter, how a grain of musk was kept in a room 
scenting it for twenty years and yet at the end of that time had lost no weight. 
Now this is marvelous if we suppose infinitesimal particles to be continually pass- 
ing off, which falling upon the nerves of smell produce the sensation we call odor. 
Yes, very marvelous, that particles can be taken from a body through so many 
years and yet not affect the weight of that body; as much as to say that innumer- 
able infinitesimal particles weigh nothing. We must confess we do not like to be- 
ieve such a story. Surely itis more reasonable to think that certain rates of 
motion among the molecules of the musk impart like rates of undulation to the 
‘‘ether” and these ethereal waves reaching our nostrils produce the sensation 
called smell. As in the case of the eye, the senation is various according as the 
rate is various. Sucha theory explains how the vulture scents its prey from afar. 
The molecules of the carrion impress their motion on the ‘‘ ether ” and the undula- 
tions go out and on until they fall upon and affect the keen nostrils of the bird 
quietly floating in the blue empyrean. Would a particle of the dead matter ever 
reach it, think you? 
If you ask how is it the vulture and the dog and other animals can scent 
things imperceptible to man, we reply because they are endowed with keener sen- 
sibilities in this respect. If you ask why so many vibrations do not get mixed up 
and produce confusion, we ask how is it in the great orchestra that you catch the 
peculiar tones of each particular instrument? In music we name the quality 
thus distinguishing instruments ¢imbre ; and so there may be ¢mbre in all kinds of 
vibrations or undulations. An odorous object loses its odor as soon as its pe- 
culiar rate of vibration is varied or lost. As in sound waves and light waves, 
there may be inter erence, i.e., waves which puteach other out, so tospeak, so inodor 
waves there may be interference ; thus we might explain the action of disinfectants 
and deodorizers. As to the limits of the rates of vibration, we know nothing. 
Taste and touch are said to be produced by contact of substances with the 
nerves of the tongue and the skin. Yet perhaps the various peculiarities in taste 
and touch may be ascribed to peculiarities in rate of molecular motion. A thing 
is sour or sweet, bitter or nauseous or acid, occording as its molecular vibrations 
affect the nerves of the different parts of the tongue adapted for the reception of 
rates producing such sensations. We have however no arguments in favor of 
this. As for touch, that requires contact also, just as does taste. 
Let us see how we would explain the various peculiarities of surface of bodies 
as learned by touch. 
As the finger is brought in contact with the fine point of a needle, for in- 
stance, the molecules of the papille in the finger end come in contact in their 
little oscillation with the oscillating molecules of the needle. Of course there is 
resistance; but as this resistance occurs at but one point, we say the needle is 
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