OF ANIMALS. 



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Foods and drinks are the natural and common means of quieting their pain, 

 but there are other means that may be also employed for this purpose, and 

 which are often found to answer as a temporary substitute ; as, for instance, 

 pressure against the coats of the stomach in the case of hunger, and stimu- 

 lating the salivary glands in the case of thirst. It is hence that chewing a 

 mouthful of hay alone, or merely moistened with water, proves so refresh- 

 ing to a tired horse, and is found so serviceable when we dare not allow him 

 to slake his thirst by drinking. Savages and savage beasts are equally sensi- 

 ble of the advantage of pressure in the case of hunger, and resort to it upon 

 all occasions in which they cannot take off the pain in the usual way. 



The manis or pangolin tribes, that swallow their food whole, will swallow 

 stones or coals or any other substance, if they cannot obtain nutriment : not 

 that their instinct deceives them, but for the purpose of acquiring such a 

 pressure as may blunt the sense of hunger, which is found so corroding. 

 Almost all carnivorous beasts pursue the same plan ; and a mixture of pieces 

 of coal, stone, slate, and earth is often met with in the stomach of ostriches, 

 cassowaries, and even toads. The Kamtschatkadale obtains the same pur- 

 pose by swallowmg saw-dust ; and some of the northern Asiatic tribes by a 

 board placed over the region of the stomach, and tightened behind with cords, 

 in proportion to the severity of the suffering. Even in our own country we 

 often pursue the same end by the same means ; and employ a tight handker- 

 chief, instead of a tightened stomach-board. 



In consequence of this difference in the mode in which the matter of touch 

 or general feeling is secreted under different circumstances, we may also per- 

 ceive why some parts of the body, although perhaps as largely furnished with 

 the nerves of touch or general feeling as other parts, are far less sensible and 

 irritable ; as the bones, the teeth, and the tendons ; and why the very same 

 parts should, under other circumstances, as when morbidly affected, become 

 the most sensible or irritable of all the organs of the system ; a fact well 

 known to all, but I believe not hitherto satisfactorily accounted for by any one. 



We may see also why inflammation, attacking different organs of the body, 

 should be accompanied with very different sensations. In the bones and car- 

 tilages, except in extreme cases, it is accompanied with a dull and heavy 

 pain ; in the brain, with an oppressive and stupifying pain ; and in the sto- 

 mach, with a nauseating uneasiness. So, again, in the skin, muscles, and 

 cellular membrane, it is a pain that rouses and excites the system generally ; 

 but in those parts which are supplied with the two branches of nerves which 

 are called par vagum and sympathetic, as the loins and kidneys, the patient 

 is affected with lowness of spirits from the first attack of the inflammation.* 



Dr. Gall, whose physiological theory has excited so much attention of late 

 years on the Continent, has endeavoured to account for all these varieties of 

 feeling, and indeed for all the animal senses of every kind, both external and 

 internal, by supposing some particular part of the brain to be allotted to each, 

 and that the general character and temperament of the individual is the result 

 of the different proportions which these different parts or chambers of the 

 brain bear to one another.- He supposes, also, that this organ is possessed 

 of two distinct sets of nervous fibres — a secernent and an absorbent ; both 

 directly connected with what is called the cineritious or ash-coloured part of 

 the brain; the former issuing from it and secreting the fluid of the will, or that 

 by which the mind operates on the muscles ; and the latter terminating in it, 

 and conveying to it the fluid of the external senses, secreted by those senses 

 themselves, and communicating a knowledge of the presence and degree of 

 power of external objects. This elaborate theory, and the facts to which it 

 appeals, were very minutely investigated, a few years ago, by a very excel- 

 lent committee of the physical class of the French National Institute, assisted 

 by Mr. (now Dr.) Spurzheim, the intimate friend and coadjutor of its inventor, 

 and who is well known to have contributed quite as much to the establish- 

 ment of this speculation as himself. This committee, after a very minute 



* Hunter on Blood, p. 289, 290 



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