PERFUMES OR ODOURS OF ANIMALS 



or apparently supernatural means discover it. Not a 

 little remarkable is the fact of training or educating the 

 nose. The best and most easily-recognized examples of 

 this kind are, perhaps, the dogs that have been trained 

 to find truffles or other objects upon which they do not 

 feed. That we possess this power, but in a limited degree, 

 is obvious, and many singular instances can be adduced 

 in the case of persons such as are known as judges 

 of tea, wine, cheese, etc. They are generally called tasters ; 

 the best judges however do not taste, but aire enabled by 

 constant practice and training to discriminate, with 

 wonderful accuracy, any particular flavour or kind by 

 smell alone. 



The sense of smell, like sight and hearing, among our 

 own species, is wonderfully varied, and it constantly 

 happens that the individual most gifted in the one sense 

 is deficient in one or more of the others, and we must 

 admit our inferiority in all these senses as compared with 

 the lower animals, for the sense of smell in man as com- 

 pared with a dog sinks into insignificance. His sight, 

 compared with an eagle or vulture, is equally feeble, and 

 his power of hearing is duller than a barn owl. Never- 

 theless, man has advantages that far outbalance these 

 apparent deficiencies, because he can train or educate 

 his nose, make telescopes and microscopes for his eyes, 

 and hear all that he may require, and sometimes rather 

 more. Now, apart from mere fancy, fashion, whim, or 

 caprice, there can be no question or doubt that certain 

 scents or perfumes are liked or disliked by different in- 

 dividuals, and many very curious instances of this variable 

 love of odours are to be met with. How fi-equently are 

 those persons who keep pet dogs astonished to find their 

 otherwise clean and well-behaved favourite enter the 

 house, after having explored the dunghill or the dusthole, 



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