taste of things around tnem without the 
necessity of taking them in at the 
mouth. 
We give the sense of taste more 
credit sometimes than it merits. What 
we regard as tastes are often flavors or 
only smells. What is taken in at the 
mouth gets to the nose by the back 
way if it is of the nature of most spices, 
and so by use of the nose and the im 
agination we taste things that do not 
affect the tongue at all. A cold in the 
head shows us we do not taste cinna- 
mon, we merely experience its pun- 
gency as it smarts the tongue while its 
flavor we enjoy only with the nose. 
With some substances we have a 
mixed experience that passes for taste, 
but it is really a combination of taste, 
smell, and touch. With the nostrils 
held one can scarcely distinguish be- 
tween small quantities of pure water 
and the same with a very little' essence 
of cloves. The difference is easily ob- 
served with the nostrils open or after 
swallowing, for the odor of the mix- 
ture gets readily into the nose from 
either direction. 
It is curious to note that, although 
there are so many varieties of taste, 
man has but few words to describe 
them with. We know the taste of a 
thousand substances, and yet we are in 
nowise superior to the veriest savage 
in the matter of speaking about their 
flavors. We are obliged to speak in 
the same manner as the wild man of 
the forest and say that a given taste is 
like the taste of some other thing, only 
different. 
One of the lowest forms of tongues 
is that of the gasteropod. All snails 
and slugs are gasteropods. They have 
instead of a regular tongue a strip that 
is called a lingual ribbon, one end of 
which is free and the other fastened to 
the floor of the mouth. Across the 
ribbon from left to right run rows of 
hard projections almost like teeth. 
Whatever the mouth comes against is 
tested for food qualities by this rasp- 
ing ribbon which files away at the sub- 
stance and wears away not only what 
it works upon but the ribbon itself. 
This loss of tongue is no serious affair 
to the gasteropod, for he finds his 
tongue growing constantly like a finger- 
nail and he needs to work diligently at 
his trade or suffer from undue propor- 
tions of the unruly member. Snails in 
an aquarium gnaw the green slime 
from the sides of the vessel with their 
lingual ribbons, and the process may be 
seen to more or less advantage at 
times. 
Taste is not all confined to tongues. 
Some people have papillae on the in- 
side of the cheek. Medusae (Jelly 
Fish) have no tongues, but the quali- 
ties of the sea-water are noted by them. 
As soon as rain begins to fall into the 
sea they proceed directly towards the 
bottom, showing a decided aversion to 
having their water thinned in any way. 
Leeches show their powers of dis- 
tinguishing tastes when they take in 
sweetened water quite freely, but suck 
at the skin of a sick man much less 
than at that of one in good health. 
Taste in insects has its probable seat 
in many instances in a pair of short 
horns or feelers back of the antennae. 
These are constantly moving over the 
parts of that which the insect is feed- 
ing upon, and so apparently enjoyable 
is the motion of them that many scien- 
tists have concluded that these are the 
taste organs of the insects having them. 
At the same time it is quite probable 
that in all insects furnished with sa- 
livary glands, a proboscis, or a tongue, 
the power of taste is also or exclu- 
sively there. 
Fishes seem to do most of their tast- 
ing somewhere down in the stomach, 
for they puisue their prey voraciously 
and frequently swallow it whole. With 
their gristly gums, in many cases 
almost of the toughness of leather, 
there can be but little sensation of 
taste. Their equally hard tongues, 
many times fairly bristling with teeth 
constructed for capturing, but not for 
chewing, cannot possibly afford much 
of a taste of what is going down the 
throat with the rushing water passing 
through the open mouth and gills. 
Serpents which swallow their food 
alive can get but little taste of their 
victims as they pass over the tongue, 
although they are deliberate in the act 
and cover them with a profusion of 
saliva. 
It is quite possible that cattle in 
