74 Dr. Russell and Mr. Home’s Description of the 
* The external orifice is of the size of a crow-quill ; it leads into 
“ a bag not larger than a small marble, which is lined with a 
“ cuticle, with hair. From this bag there is a secretion of a 
“ limpid fluid, which keeps oozing down the nose.” This gen- 
tleman, unfortunately for natural history, died at Sumatra, soon 
after the date of his letter. 
In the Hunterian Museum, intrusted by government to the 
care of the College of Surgeons, there are several specimens of 
these bags, from the Egyptian antelope with annulated horns, 
and also from some other species : these are preserved so as to 
show the internal cavity of the bag, and the structure of the 
gland immediately behind it. In these specimens, the glandular 
part is ~ of an inch in thickness; from the centre of this gland, 
an excretory duct opens into the bag, immediately opposite to 
the external orifice. The bag itself is lined with a cuticle, and 
thinly set with strong hairs. 
The facts now produced are sufficient to prove that these bags 
have a secretion of their own, the quantity of which varies, ac- 
cording to the climate and other circumstances ; and there is 
no reason for thinking that the tears ever pass into them, the 
passage into the nose being unusually free, and the orifices in 
the bags, in many species, unfavourably situated for the reception 
of the tears. 
We are at present unacquainted with the use to which the 
fluid secreted in these bags is applied. 
As amphibious animals, in general, have no glands to supply 
the skin with moisture from within, but receive it by coming in 
contact with moist substances, it is possible the bags, in the 
snake, may be supplied in that manner, and the more so, as the 
cuticular lining appears perfect. 
