y-' 
TAW 
along its surface, and particularly at tire 
top and sides. Hartley considers this sense 
as extending to the otiier parts of the month, 
down the throat, the stomach, and the other 
parts of the clrannel tor food. Taken in 
this comprehensive sense, the sense of taste 
conveys to the mind sensations not only of 
flavours, hut of hunger and thirst. 
In order to produce the sense of taste, 
the nervous extremities of the tongue must 
he moistened, and the action of eating ge- 
nerally produces an effusion of a fluid from 
different parts of the mouth, which answers 
the purpose of exciting the taste and of as- 
sisting digestion. The pleasures derived 
from taste arc very considerable; and the 
power of yielding pleasurable sensations ac- 
companies the taste through the whole 
of life. Hence it is reasonable to infer 
that the pleasures of taste constitute one 
grand source of the mental pleasures, that 
is, those which can be felt without the di- 
rect intervention of sensation. They leave 
their relicts in the mind ; and these com- 
bine together, with other pleasures, and 
thus form feelings which often connect 
themselves w'ith objects which have no im- 
mediate connection with the objects of 
taste. To this source Hartley traces the 
principal origin of the social pleasures ; and 
there cannot be a doubt that the pleasures 
of taste are the chief original sources of the 
tilial affection. It appears that one end of 
the long continuance of the pleasures of 
taste is to supply continual accessions of vi- 
vidness to the mental pleasures ; but doubt- 
less, the principal object is to make that a 
source of pleasure, which is necessary for 
self-preservation. Tiie pams of taste are 
ranch less numerous than those of feeling. 
They arc only such as are necessary to 
prompt to avoid excessive abstinence or 
gialification, and to prevent the employ- 
ment of improper food ; and therefore de- 
pend much more upon causes which man 
usually has under his own contronl. 
Ta\jGHT, a term used in maritime bu- 
siness, to denote the state of being extend- 
ed, or stretched out, and is usually applied 
in opposition to slack. 
TAURUS, the bull, in zoology. See 
Bos. 
Taurus, in astronomy, one of the twelve 
' signs of the zodiac, the second in order, con- 
sisting of forty-four stars, according to Pto- 
lemy ; of forty-one, according to Tycho ; 
and of no less than one hundred and thirty- 
five, according to the Britannic catalogue. 
TAWING, the art of dressing skins in 
TEA 
vvliite, so as to be fit for divers manufac- 
tnre.s, particularly gloves, &c. All skins 
may be tawed ; but those chiefly used for 
this purpose are lambs, sheep, kids, and 
goat skins. 
TAXUS, in botany, yeiv-tree, a genus of 
the Dioecia Monadelpliia class and order. 
Natural order ofConiferae. Essential cha- 
racter : male calyx none ; corolla none ; sta- 
mina many ; anthers peltate, eight-cleft ; 
female corolla none ; style none ; seed one, 
in a berried calycle that is quite entire. 
There are four species, we shall notice the 
T. haccata, common yew-tree, which has a 
straight trunk, with a smooth, deciduous 
bark; the wood is hard, tough, and of a 
fine grain ; leaves thickly set, linear, smooth, 
ev.er-green ; flowers axillary, enveloped with 
imbricate bractes ; the male on one tree, 
sulphur-coloured, without a calyx; the fe- 
male on another, with a small green calyx, 
sustaining the oval flattish seed, which ca- 
lyx at length becomes red, soft, full of a 
sweet slimy pulp. The yew-tree is a native 
of Europe, North America, and Japan ; its 
proper situation is in mountainous woods, 
or more particularly the clef ts of high calca- 
reous rocks. England formerly possessed 
great abundance, and it is now not very un- 
common, in a wild state, in some parts of 
the country. Of planted trees there are 
yet several in church yards. Mr. Evelyn 
mentions a yew-tree in the church-yard 
of Crowhurst, in Surrey, which was ten 
yards in compass ; another in Braburne 
church yard, not far from Scot’s Hall, in 
Kent, being fifty-eight feet, eleven inches, 
in circumference, or nearly twenty feet in 
diameter. 
TE-ARS, a name for the limpid fluid se- 
creted by the lachrymal glands, arid flowmg 
on the surface of the eye; either in conse- 
quence of local irritation, or the emotions 
of gt ief. Some part of this aiiueous fluid is 
dissipated in the air; hut the greatest part, 
after having performed its office, is propell- 
ed by the orbicular muscle, which so close- 
ly constrinses the eye-lid to the ball of the 
eye as to leave no space between, unless in 
the internal angle, where the tears are col- 
lected. 
From this collection the tears are ab- 
sorbed by the orifices of the punctae lachry- 
maliae; from thence they are propelled 
through the lachrymal canals into the la- 
chrymal sac, and flow tbrongh the dnetns 
nasalis into the cavity of the nostrils, under 
the inferior concha nasalis. The tears have 
no smell, but a saltish taste. The uses of the 
