6126 



Scent. 



What the nature of this emanation or effluvium may be is a ques- 

 tion of much difficulty; indeed, I doubt if it admits of more than 

 hypothetical solution. There are at least two very distinct species of 

 odours or scents, —distinct, I mean, as regards their elements and 

 nature, — the one depending on, or rather, perhaps, consisting of a 

 substance, whether vaporous or molecular; the other apparently 

 without any such dependence. The former may be instanced in any 

 so-called volatile* odorous substance, such as carbonate of ammonia 

 or camphor; the latter in musk and two or three other substances of 

 a somewhat similar nature : this sustains no diminution in weight, 

 though continuously giving off its peculiar penetrating odour for a 

 lengthened period ; that sustains rapid diminution in weight as long 

 as it remains subjected to the volatilising agencies. To which of 

 these two classes, or whether exclusively to either, scent belongs, it 

 seems impossible to say. The probability seems to be — and I shall 

 give reasons for the opinion as I go on — that it partakes of both 

 natures ; that there is something in it corresponding to the sub- 

 stantiality of the one, and to the imponderability of the other. 



General reference has already been made to the glandular odori- 

 ferous secretion peculiar to each several animal : and, in illustration 

 of the point, I shall only adduce two or three particular instances; 

 such, for example, as that of the fox, which " has a subcaudal gland 

 that secretes an intolerably fetid substance, and whose urine also pos- 

 sesses the same intolerable odour'' (Bell, Br. Quadr. 256); that of the 

 polecat or foulmart, which derives the latter name from the fact that 

 a " disgusting odour is produced by the exudation of a fetid secre- 

 tion from a pouch or follicle under the tail, and which is even more 

 intolerable than than that of the common weasel or the stoat" {Id, 

 159); that of the beaver, familiar to almost every one from childhood 

 in connection with the old fable; that of man himself, from the 



glands of whose axilla f is secreted, or eliminated from the blood, 

 a peculiar odorous matter" (Kirke's 'Handbook of Physiology,' 348 ; 

 Carpenter's 'Human Physiology,' 231). 



* *' The most odorous substances are volatile, and vice versa, ^ ^ though 

 there are some volatile fluids, such as water, which are entirely inodorous " (Carp. 

 Hum. Phys. 905). 



f " In certain situations the sweat-glands are very large; and, as might be 

 expected, we find their size and number in different districts of the skin to correspond 

 with the amount of perspiration afforded by each. Thus they are nowhere so remark- 

 able, or so easily examined, as in the axilla, over a space precisely delined by the 

 jrvowth of the hair in the adult. They here form a layer, which towards the middle is 

 often one-eighth of an inch thick.'' (Todd and Bowman, Phys. Anatomy, 423). 



