Chapter III (2)

In the Edinburgh Journal of Natural History we find the following passage: "We are assured by M. Yvart, that in Auvergne fat soups are given to cattle, especially when sick or enfeebled, for the purpose of invigorating them. The same practice is observed in some parts of North America, where the country people mix, in winter, fat broth with the vegetables given to their cattle, in order to render them more capable of resisting the severity of the weather. These broths have been long considered efficacious by the veterinary practitioners of our own country, in restoring horses which have been enfeebled through long illness. It is said by Peall to be a common practice in some parts of India to mix animal substances with the grain given to feeble horses, and to boil the mixture into a sort of paste, which soon brings them into good condition, and restores their vigour. Pallas tells us, that the Russian boors make use of the dried flesh of the hamster, reduced to powder, and mixed with oats, and that this occasions their horses to acquire a sudden and extraordinary degree of _embonpoint_. Anderson relates, in his History of Iceland, that the inhabitants feed their horses with dried fishes when the cold is very intense, and that these animals are extremely vigorous, though small. We also know, that in the Feroë Islands, the Orkneys, the Western Islands, and in Norway, where the climate is still very cold, this practice is also adopted; and it is not uncommon, in some very warm countries, as in the kingdom of Muskat, in Arabia Felix, near the Straits of Ormuz, one of the most fertile parts of Arabia; fish and other animal substances are there given to the horses in the cold season, as well as in times of scarcity."

In Norway, or at least in some districts of that country, the cattle are housed during the long winter months, and fed partially upon hay, but more plentifully on a kind of diet, which, strange and disgusting as we may think it, is said to be much relished. This consists of a thick gelatinous soup, made by boiling the heads of fish, and mixing horse-dung with the broth; so that the boat of a Norwegian farmer supplies not only himself and his family with the staple portion of winter subsistence, but his cows also.

We doubt much whether any wild herbivorous animals will feed upon poisonous plants; they are constantly in the exercise of their instinctive faculties, and to these faculties the organs of taste (and smell) administer. Hence they constantly reject all that is deleterious. But this is not the case with domestic animals, whose instinct is much enfeebled, or curbed, from the peculiar circumstances in which they are placed. Hence accidents often happen, to the great loss of the farmer; for example, both horses and horned cattle will crop the foliage of the yew, which offers a temptation to them, especially if underfed, or fed almost exclusively on dry fodder; the foliage of the yew is poisonous. Cattle often perish from eating the long-leaved water hemlock, or cowbane, (_Cicuta virosa_.) "When Linnæus visited Tornea, he found a terrible malady sweeping away the cattle of the district, and which he at once traced to the long-leaved water hemlock. Scarcely, in fact, had he crossed the river, and landed from his boat on the meadow, before he felt convinced of the origin of the mischief. This deadly plant grew there in abundance, and it appeared that as soon as the cattle left off their winter fodder, and returned to pasturage, they died swollen and convulsed; as the summer came on the mortality decreased, and still more so with the advance of autumn.

"The least attention," says Linnæus, "will convince us that brutes reject whatever is hurtful to them, and distinguish poisonous from salutary plants by natural instinct, so that this plant is not eaten by them in the summer and autumn, which is the reason that in those seasons so few cattle die; namely, such only as either by accident or pressed by extreme hunger eat of it. But when they are let into the pastures in spring, partly from their greediness after fresh herbs, and partly from the emptiness and hunger they have undergone during a long winter, they devour every green thing which comes in their way. It happens, moreover, that herbs at this time are small, and scarcely supply food in sufficient quantity. They are, besides, more juicy, and covered with water, and smell less strong, so that what is noxious is not easily discerned from what is wholesome. I observed, likewise, that the radical leaves were always bitter, the other not, which confirms what I have just said. I saw this plant in an adjoining meadow, mowed along with grass for winter fodder; and, therefore, it is not wonderful that some cattle, though but a few, should die of it in winter. After I left Tornea, I saw no more of this plant till I came to the vast meadows near Limmingen, where it appeared along the road, and when I got into the town I heard the same complaints as at Tornea, of the annual loss of cattle, with the same circumstances." Monkshood, meadow-sweet, hemlock, (_Conium maculatum_,) meadow-saffron, foxglove, etc., are occasionally eaten by cows, and prove fatal.

The sense of taste varies greatly in different animals; in granivorous birds, in reptiles and fishes generally, we cannot suppose that the impressions made on the gustatory nerves are at all delicate; they swallow their food entire at a single gulp, and their tongue is covered with a thick or a horny cuticle. Among birds, the carnivorous tribes, the parrots, and the swans, and true ducks, possess the sense of taste in considerable perfection. Among reptiles, tortoises and vegetable-feeding lizards, as the iguana, are, as it would seem, superior to the others; and among fishes, it is probable that those which feed on marine or aquatic vegetables, are endowed with a higher degree of taste than those which prey upon other fishes, which they engulph at once. It cannot be denied that many insects, as bees, wasps, butterflies, the house-fly, and various others, enjoy a keen sense of taste, and relish the sweets which prove so attractive to them.

Among the mollusca, some, at least, are endowed with the sense of taste in no low degree; the snail and the slug are examples in point, as the gardener can readily testify.

What information do we gain by the sense of taste? The eye and the ear conduce to our mental improvement, to our store of knowledge, to our appreciation of the sublime and beautiful. Eloquence, music, poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture, scenery--the glory of the sun, and the moon, and the stars--these appeal to our mind through the organs of sight and hearing; but the sense of taste administers rather to our animal than to our intellectual being, and, doubtless, the pleasures of taste contribute greatly to the enjoyments of our existence. Taste, then, belongs to us less as spiritual, intellectual, immortal beings, than as corporeal, mortal beings; nevertheless, it is part of our nature, implanted in us by an all-wise God, in order that we should relish the provisions for sustaining life, which he has so bountifully provided. To pretend that we are indifferent to the pleasure or the disgust resulting from taste is an untruth--nay, it is to say that God's gifts to us are not worth our consideration. Our Lord and Saviour was one of a party at a marriage feast, and when the wine was exhausted, he turned water into wine, which was superior to that previously passed round. "This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory."[19] But while, with a healthy appetite we relish our food, giving thanks to God for his bounty, let us not be epicures or gluttons; let our moderation be seen; let us use, not abuse, the gifts of our heavenly Father.

[19] John ii. 11.

4. _Smell._--On a fine, filmy membrane, which lines the labyrinth of the nasal cavities, are distributed the delicate ramifications of the olfactory nerves, or the nerves of smell. These nerves are constructed for transmitting to the mind impressions arising from the floating exhalations of odoriferous substances. It is through these nasal cavities, principally, that man and quadrupeds breathe; hence the respiration of the air informs us of our proximity to objects disgusting and noxious, or, on the contrary, attractive from their fragrance. Surely we need not adduce instances in proof of our position. The scent of putrescent animal or vegetable matters is in itself a warning to us to retire from the locality of mortific corruption, and escape from the region of disease. How loathsome to our sense are these putrescent effluvia! They nauseate us even to sickness--nay, sometimes almost to fainting; indeed, the writer has seen a violent fit of epilepsy produced by the overpowering and horribly disgusting odour of the matter contained in the scent pouch of a small quadruped, the grison, (_Galictis vittata_,) which he was dissecting, the sufferer being a practical zoologist, accustomed to the dissecting-room.

But when the voice of the nightingale is heard, and the air is loaded with the perfume of the hawthorn blossom, and of thousands of spring flowers, are we not invited, as it were by a secret call, to walk abroad through woodlands and meadows, contemplating the works of God? We are thus lured to beneficial exercise--to inhale

"The breezy fragrance of the morn"--

to forget the trials of life, and muse upon a still brighter world, where the flowers perish not, where storms come not, and where winter is unknown. Thus, to our bodily health do our senses administer; and thus the sense of smell calls us from the close room of the populous city, into the fresh air of the country--from the crowded town,

"Where houses thick and sewers annoy the air,"

to issue forth on a summer's morn, and breathe the pure air redolent of sweetest odours.

When overpoweringly offensive effluvia disgust us, we endeavour to stop our breath--we breathe at protracted intervals, take in as little air as possible, and endeavour to escape from the infected locality; but do we flee away from the gale bearing the scent of the honey-suckle, the bean-field, or the new-mown hay? It is, indeed, rather to our pleasures, to our mental enjoyment, to our delight, or to our disgust and abhorrence, that our sense of smell administers. We depend little upon it for our discrimination between things acting as poison, and things nutritious or wholesome. How pleasant is the smell of laurel-water or prussic acid--how dull and insipid the smell of wheaten flour! We must not, then, always be guided by our sense of smell, although in general it serves us as a monitor.

The sense of smell is intimately combined with that of taste; indeed, it is a powerful auxiliary to it, for, as a learned writer well observes, "taste, without the aid of smell, would be very vague in its indications, and limited in its range." Nevertheless, savage people, in whom the sense of smell is far more acute than in civilized races, do not appear to possess a greater refinement of taste--indeed, what the former regard as delicacies would be rejected by the latter with abhorrence. Most quadrupeds possess the sense of smell in far greater perfection than man, and are evidently influenced by it in their choice or rejection of food. In the carnivorous tribes this sense is, perhaps, at its highest ratio, and many pursue their prey guided by their olfactory organs alone.

Certain odours are agreeable to some few animals, irrespective of food; but on this point our range of information is limited. The cat delights in the scent of valerian, and some other herbs, although they are not among the articles of this animal's diet; yet to the cat and the dog, the odour of the sweetest flowers yields no pleasure. Birds, in general, are endowed with the sense of smell in a far lower degree than quadrupeds, and the olfactory organs are far less developed. Birds of prey are guided by their keen powers of vision, and, indeed, if we are to trust to the experiments of Audubon, the sense of smell even in the carrion-loving vulture, contrary to the opinion of the ancients, as well as of modern naturalists, is at a low ratio; for, as he asserts, the stuffed skin of an animal will attract a vulture from its "pride of place," in the upper regions of the air. It is true that this assertion has been contradicted by Mr. Waterton, but it is again confirmed by the experiments and observations of Mr. Bachman, which are recorded in Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, viii. 167; and M. Levuillant seems to have considered that it is by the eye chiefly, if not exclusively, that the vulture obtains its disgusting food. The following observations from the proceedings of the Zoological Society will be here, perhaps, not unacceptable:--

March 14th, 1837.--"A paper was read on the habits of the _Vultur Aura_, by Mr. W. Sells, with notes of the dissections of the heads of two specimens, by Mr. R. Owen. The writer states, that this bird is found in great abundance in the island of Jamaica, where it is known by the name of _John Crow_; and so valuable are its services in the removal of carrion and animal filth, that the legislature have imposed a fine of £5 upon any one destroying it within a stated distance of the principal towns. Its ordinary food is carrion, but when pressed hard with hunger, it will seize upon young fowls, rats, and snakes. After noticing the highly offensive odour emitted from the eggs of this bird when broken, Mr. Sells relates the following instances which have come under his own personal observation, for the purpose of proving that the _Vultur Aura_ possesses the sense of smell in a very acute degree.

"It has been questioned whether the vulture discovers its food by means of the organ of smell or that of sight. I apprehend that its powers of vision are very considerable, and of most important use; but that it is principally from highly organized olfactories that it so speedily receives intelligence of where the savoury morsel is to be found, will plainly appear by the following facts. In hot climates, the burial of the dead commonly takes place in about twenty-four hours after death, and that necessarily, so rapidly does decomposition take place. On one occasion, I had to make a _post mortem_ examination of a body within twenty hours after death, in a mill-house completely concealed, and while so engaged the roof of the mill-house was thickly studded with these birds. Another instance was that of an old patient and much valued friend, who died at midnight; the family had to send for necessaries for the funeral to Spanish Town, distant thirty miles, so that the interment could not take place until noon of the second day, or thirty-six hours after his decease, long before which time--and a most painful sight it was--the ridge of the shingled roof of his house, a large mansion of but one floor, had a number of these melancholy heralds of death perched thereon, beside many more which had settled in trees in its immediate vicinity. In these cases, the birds must have been directed by smell alone, as sight was totally out of the question.

"In opposition to the above opinion, it has been stated by Mr. Audubon, that vultures and other birds of prey possess the sense of smell in a very inferior degree to carnivorous quadrupeds, and that, so far from guiding them to their prey from a distance, it affords them no indication of its presence even when at hand. In confirmation of this opinion, he relates, that he stuffed the skin of a deer full of hay, and placed it in a field; in a few minutes a vulture lighted near it, and directly proceeded to attack it, but finding no eatable food, he at length quitted it. And he further relates, that a dead dog was concealed in a narrow ravine, twenty feet below the surface of the earth around it, and filled with briers and high canes; that many vultures were seen sailing over the spot, but none discovered it. I may remark upon the above experiments, that, in the first case, the stag was doubtless _seen_ by the birds, but it does not follow that they might not also have smelt the hide, although inodorous to the human nose; in the second case, the birds had been undoubtedly attracted by the _smell_, however embarrassed they might have been by the concealment of the object which caused it. I have, in many hundred instances, seen the vulture feeding upon small objects under rocks, bushes, and in other situations, where it was utterly impossible that the bird could have discovered them but through the sense of smell; and we are to recollect, that the habit of the vulture is that of soaring aloft in the air, and not that of foraging upon the ground."

To this account are appended the details of a minute comparison, by professor Owen, of the olfactory nerves and the olfactory branch of the fifth pair in the _Vultur Aura_, with those of the common turkey and the goose. The learned anatomist concludes by saying, "the above notes show that the vulture has a well-developed organ of smell, but whether he finds his prey by that sense alone, or in what degree it assists, anatomy is not so well calculated to explain as experiment."

It is far from being impossible that Mr. Waterton and Mr. Wells on one side, and Mr. Audubon and his party on the other, may be both correct, for in different species of vulture the power of smell may greatly differ; we know that it does among carnivorous quadrupeds, which seek their prey, some chiefly by sight, others by their acuteness of scent. Among reptiles, the sense of smell appears to be at a low ratio, nor can we suppose that it is acute in fishes. In fact, in fishes the nasal cavities are rudimental, and do not communicate with the organs of respiration. They are nothing more than blind sacs, placed one on each side in front of the head, with two external openings appertaining to each sac. The principal entrance is valvular, and on a curiously plaited membrane in the sac itself, or on tufted or arborescent filaments, are the ramifications of the olfactory nerves distributed. That fishes are attracted or repelled by the odorous effluvia of bodies, diffused either through the water itself or through the air which the water contains, is too well ascertained to be denied. Fishes, in fact, are attracted by certain odoriferous substances, and anglers often use baits impregnated with some volatile oil.[20]

[20] On this subject see Izaak Walton's "Complete Angler."

We cannot for a moment doubt that insects smell; that ants and bees are greatly directed by this sense in their search after food; that carrion-loving beetles are thereby guided from a distance to their repast; that the flesh-fly is led to putrescent animal substances; and we know that the flesh-fly is sometimes deceived by the smell of certain plants emitting a cadaverous odour, and deposits her eggs upon them, the larvæ perishing for want of proper food. In what organ the senses of smell in insects are placed does not appear very plain, and the like observation applies to the _crustacea_, as crabs and lobsters, for which baited traps are set, and into which they are allured by their sense of smell.

No distinct organs of smell have been discovered in the mollusca, yet it is incontestable that some of these creatures are capable of appreciating odours. We cannot suppose that in the highly-organized and savage cuttle-fish this sense is wanting; and we know that snails and slugs are attracted from a distance by the odour of the favourite plants or fruits on which they feed. The garden slugs are fond of animal food, as we can testify, and they will pick bones with relish; we have seen the hollow of a marrow-bone thrown into the garden filled the next morning with slugs, which had completely cleaned it.

Whether the bivalve mollusks, as mussels, oysters, clams, etc., have any definite sense of smell, we cannot ascertain, but we conjecture that they are endowed with the sense of taste, for they know what to accept and what to refuse.

We have said that man derives pleasure or disgust from the exercise of the sense of smell, and is greatly directed thereby what to choose and what to avoid; yet this sense harmonizes with those of sight, hearing, and more particularly of taste, to render this world delightful to us, if we use God's gifts aright. Has he not scattered the loveliest flowers in garden and meadow? Has he not created fruits that gratify alike the sight, the touch, the taste, and the smell? Has he not spread the beauties of nature around us? Was not the garden of Eden prepared for our first parents? Yes; but sin has entered the world, and over flower and fruit has been the "trail of the serpent."

A few passages from the Scriptures, on which we need not comment, will serve to show the figurative notice of, or reference to this sense by the sacred writers, in order to influence the mind of man through an appeal to his own sensations. "An odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God," Phil. iv. 18. Works pleasing to the Lord, deeds of charity and mercy, done by the believer as a testimony of his lively faith, and a proof to the world that faith engenders good works; such works, and not those of the pharisee, are an odour acceptable to God. "Walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour," Eph. v. 2. Let us, who call ourselves Christians, so walk, that our conduct before men may be after the pattern of Him, who, in love to a fallen race, offered himself as a sacrifice fragrant unto God the Father, that we might escape the sword of justice. When Noah offered burnt-offerings on the altar, "the Lord smelled a sweet savour," Gen. viii. 21; and to Him even now, O reader, will be fragrant true penitence and faith in that Mediator, of whom the sacrifices under the primitive dispensation were but types, and in this sense only did they waft incense to the throne of the Almighty! The language is altogether figurative; but how pertinent to our feelings, and therefore how clear to our understanding, and how forcible!

5. _Touch._--Of all the senses, not one is so important to us as that of tact or touch. It is the foundation, as it were, of all our knowledge of the material world, and according to their elevation in the scale of being do animals enjoy this sense in greater perfection, and possess organs in which it is more especially concentrated. We here distinguish, between mere feeling and touch. We consider the wings of the bat, and the antennæ of insects, rather as feelers than as organs of exact appreciation. The sense of feeling is diffused over the whole surface of our body; but the sense of touch, so far as man is concerned, resides in the hand, and especially in the pulpy tips of the fingers.

It is true that we use the word feel when we test the qualities of bodies with our hands, and in this sense our hands are feelers. But we derive a knowledge from the use of our hands, which no other animal derives from the exercise of any organ of tact it may possess. Nor is this to be wondered at, for in all other animals tact or touch administers only to their physical necessities. For example, the sense of touch in the pulpy end of the beak of the snipe or woodcock must be exquisite--multitudinous are the nerves supplying that part--for even the soft worm or larva in the oozy ground is felt, and the finger of man would most probably fail here; but in man the sense of touch appeals to the mind, and communicates mental pleasure, mental instruction, or even mental disquietude. Even as discords in music, or grating sounds, such as the filing of a saw, or the rubbing of cork against a wall, excite the nervous system through the mind, so does the sense of touch disturb the mind and body when that which is touched is discordant. A lady of the writer's acquaintance, by no means timid, and by no means afraid of snakes, was induced to let a common snake glide through her hand; she bore the sensation with firmness, but she nearly fainted when the snake had crept through her grasp, and described the working of the reptile's ribs and abdominal plates as communicating an indescribable sensation. Yet that snake was a sort of pet, and she used to stroke its head, and feel its lambent tongue quiver against her hand. She was not afraid, but the sensation jarred like discordant notes.

Were persons to write down their experiences of the pleasing and unpleasing sensations derived through the medium of the different senses, and were those notes collected together, we should have a mass of most interesting and instructive information, well worthy the study of a physiologist. After all, however, the sense of touch or tact gives less pleasure to man than that of sight, hearing, taste, or smell; it appreciates neither colours nor harmony, nor the flavour of luscious viands, nor the odour of flowers and perfumes; but it communicates greatly to his store of information. It is a "matter of fact" sense, and though an old poet has said--

"Have you felt the wool of the beaver,
Or swan's down, ever?"

it is not one of the senses which figure on the page of poetry or romance.

We discriminate, then, between the sense of touch and that of mere feeling. Most probably all animals, even the lowest mollusks, feel,--nay, even animals in which no nerves are to be discovered, as the acalephæ, or jelly fishes; but touch is a refinement upon feeling, which is restricted within certain zoological bounds. A learned writer says: "The conditions on which the perfection of the sense of touch depends are, first, an abundant provision of soft papillæ, supplied with numerous nerves; secondly, a certain degree of fineness in the cuticle; thirdly, a soft cushion of a cellular substance beneath the skin; fourthly, a hard resisting basis, such as that which is provided in the nails of the human fingers; and lastly, it is requisite that the organ be so constructed as to be capable of being readily applied, in a variety of directions, to the unequal surfaces of bodies, for the closer the contact, the more accurate will be the perceptions conveyed. In forming an estimate of the degree of perfection in which the sense is exercised in any particular animal, we must accordingly take into account the mobility, the capability of flexion, and the figure of the parts employed as organs of touch."[21]

[21] Dr. Roget.

This is decidedly true as regards the higher orders of creation; but let us look at insects--do not bees, and wasps, and flies feel? can we watch a fly brushing its head and wings, and rubbing its little paws against each other, without an assurance that it enjoys the sense of touch? and what shall we say of the spider, that feels at each thread, and "lives along its line?" Surely its sense of touch must be sufficiently acute; yet it is limited to a certain given object, and the spider gains only that information which bears upon its animal necessities. But the sense of touch gives to man a number of the properties of matter, which he retains as abstract ideas, such as dimension, form, condition of surface, hardness, softness, elasticity, compressibility, fluidity, quiescence, motion. In many and most important respects it assists the eye; and, indeed, the senses of sight and of touch appear to be correctors and supporters of each other. As in the case of every other sense, accuracy is greatly improved by habit, yet the qualities of matter, under the dominion of touch, are ascertained in so correct a manner that we are scarcely ever deceived by the knowledge thus acquired.

Dr. Fleming, in his "Philosophy of Zoology," thus writes: "The sense of touch appears in man to be able to obtain nearly all the information, with regard to external objects, which it is capable of receiving. In a few instances, the lower animals surpass us in the delicacy of the sense, as the bat, which is warned indirectly by its aid of the presence of bodies previous to coming in contact with them. The feelers of insects are likewise better adapted for exploring the condition of the surface of bodies than any organ which we possess. But in all these the sensibility of touch is limited to particular qualities, or confined within narrow bounds. The human hand, on the contrary, by its motions, the pliability and strength of the fingers, and their softness, is the most extensive and perfect organ of touch possessed by any animal."

The accuracy of the sense of touch is greatly improved by habit; and when its resources are in constant demand, as in the instance of persons deprived of sight, or born blind, its discriminating powers are wonderfully increased. The same observation applies also to the sense of hearing, which in blind persons generally is extremely acute and accurate in its perceptions. In a Monthly Volume, published by the Religious Tract Society, and entitled "Comparisons of Structure in Animals: the Hand and the Arm," the reader will find a general account of the structure and uses of the anterior limbs of man and the lower animals, and of the substitutes for the hand, as an organ of touch and prehension, with which many of the latter are provided.

Dr. Fleming regards the "sense of heat" as distinct from that of touch, and, in fact, as claiming to be one of the senses. "The sense of touch," he writes, "is exclusively occupied with examinations of the conditions of resistance. Contact, therefore, is indispensably requisite for enabling the organ to act upon the object, and muscular exertion to examine its condition. Neither of these is necessary to enable the sense of heat to act. Caloric rays emanate from a heated body, though at a distance; and in order to ascertain their direction and intensity no muscular effort is required. When the heated body happens to be in contact with us, we in like manner examine its conditions in reference to temperature without any muscular exertions, or, rather, we try to avoid them. Thus, when I lay my hand upon the table to examine its hardness or smoothness, I make an obvious muscular effort with my fingers; but when I lay my hand upon the table to examine its temperature, I endeavour to check all motion, so as to keep my hand in the same position. These qualities of the sense of heat sufficiently distinguish it from that of touch, with which it has been confounded, and justify its establishment as a distinct power of perception."

It is true that we cannot test caloric by the touch, but it does not appear to us that an appreciation of caloric involves any other sense than that of ordinary cutaneous feeling; the feeling of heat or cold is a mere sensation, agreeable or painful as circumstances may be, and it is natural that we should wish to experience that temperature which is most congenial to us. We say that marble is cold and wood warm, yet both may be of the same temperature; but the marble produces a sensation of coolness, because it rapidly abstracts caloric from the part applied to it; the skin is, in fact, a very imperfect thermometer, yet sufficient for all ordinary purposes. It conceals the machinery of our bodies, giving beauty of outline and appearance, and being provided with a most minute network of nerves of sensation, it gives us warning by the pain experienced of what things are to be avoided. "A burned child dreads the fire" is an old saying, and a boy who has been stung by a nettle will not rashly meddle with the plant again.

All our senses require training and education; they are taught, even as we are taught language. It is some time before the infant sees distinctly, or forms any idea of size, proportion, or distance; long before it hears accurately, and understands a word of speech; longer still before it discriminates between musical notes; it is long before delicious odours are relished, and long before there is much distinction of flavour in food, for instinct directs the infant to its mother's breast, and for many a year sweet viands are chiefly acceptable. Habit, exercise, practice, then improve the power and acuteness of the senses, but simple feeling is blunted by habit and exercise.

It is, we think, Mr. Lane who tells us, that in Egypt and elsewhere, persons who have hoarded wealth are in the habit of inflicting the bastinado on themselves, increasing the number of strokes by degrees, in order to inure themselves to a mode of extortion of which they are constantly in dread. They hope to be able to weary out their tormentors, or convince them by endurance of their poverty, and so preserve their bags of gold and silver. Idolatrous devotees in India accustom themselves to self-inflicted torture, and feel much less than we might suppose; nay, even in our own country, in times of spiritual darkness, when by mortification and penance men hoped to merit heaven, how many have worn a shirt of horsehair till custom had made it no hardship! The ancient Britons bore, almost unclothed, the severities of winter; and we have read a story, but where we cannot recollect, to the following purport:--A North American Indian was asked, how, nearly naked as he was, he bore with such ease the summer's heat and the winter's cold; he asked the inquirer, how his face, exposed to the weather, endured the changes. My face, said the white man, is hardened to it; and I, retorted the red man, am face all over.

We have said it is long before an infant is in the full use of its bodily senses: now with regard to feeling the infant is acutely sensitive; but who ever saw a child of a few months old examine the qualities of objects by the touch? it cannot even manipulate; it cannot use its hands; it has to learn the art of touch, and to improve by practice and the exercise of the mind. For example, some persons will pass a piece of silk or cloth between their fingers, and tell you its quality; and so with respect to other things; this is the result of attention and exercise.

No one is born without the organization necessary for the development of the sense of touch, for if the arms and hands be deficient, some other part, as the lips or tongue, will take up the function, and this alone shows what education effects; but if a person be born deaf, or blind, or incapable of taste and smell, (which latter appears to be very rare, if, indeed, the case ever occur,) no other part can supply the loss; but the loss, as far as the sight at least is concerned, is partly compensated for by the elevation of the sense of touch; and in this we see the immediate bearing of these two senses on each other.

The boy born blind, upon whom Cheselden so successfully operated, believed, when first he saw, that the objects touched his eyes, as the things which he felt touched his skin; consequently he had no idea of distance. "He did not know the form of any object, nor could he distinguish one object from another, however different their figure or size might be; when objects were shown to him which he had known formerly by the touch, he looked at them with attention, and observed them carefully, in order to know them again; but as he had too many objects to retain at once, he forgot the greater part of them, and when he first learned, as he said, to see and to know objects, he forgot a thousand for one that he recollected. It was two months before he discovered that pictures represented solid bodies; until that time he had considered them as planes and surfaces differently coloured, and diversified by a variety of shades; but when he began to conceive that these pictures represented solid bodies, in touching the canvass of a picture with his hand he expected to find something in reality solid upon it, and he was much astonished when, on touching those parts which seemed round and unequal, he found them flat and smooth like the rest. He asked which was the sense that deceived him--the sight or the touch. There was shown to him a little portrait of his father, which was in the case of his mother's watch; he said that he knew very well that it was the resemblance of his father, but he asked with great astonishment how it was possible for so large a visage to be kept in so small a space, as that appeared to him as impossible as that a bushel could be contained in a pint."[22]

[22] Phil. Trans., 1728.

In the Philosophical Transactions of 1826 will be found the account of a case by Mr. Wardrop, which is very interesting; it is that of an intelligent female of mature age, who was born blind; in her infancy, operations were performed on both of her eyes, but they failed, one eye being irrecoverably destroyed, and the other useless from closure of the pupil; on this eye Mr. Wardrop successfully operated: but it was not with joy that objects for the first time were perceived; she was confused by the appearance of a new world, now for the first time opened to her sense of sight; hitherto she had known it only through the sense of touch, and touch and sight had still to be reconciled. "On the sixth day, she said that she saw better than she had done on any preceding day, but I cannot tell (said she) what I do see; I am quite stupid. She seemed, indeed, bewildered from not being able to combine the knowledge acquired by the senses of sight and touch, and felt disappointed in not having the power of distinguishing at once by her eye, objects which she could so readily distinguish from one another by feeling them.

"The next day, on examining with the eye the tea-cups and saucers, and being asked what they were--I don't know, she replied; they look very queer to me, but I can tell in a minute when I touch them. So with an orange which was lying before her, she could make nothing of it until she actually touched it. When the experiment was made of giving her a silver pencil-case and a large key to examine with her hands, she discriminated and knew each distinctly; but when they were placed on the table side by side, though she distinguished each with her eye, yet she could not tell which was the pencil-case and which the key.

"In six weeks after the operation, she returned home. At this period, she had learned a great deal; she had acquired a pretty accurate notion of colours, but with regard to forms and distance she was still very ignorant. She had also great difficulty in directing her eye to an object, so that when she attempted to look at anything she turned her head in various directions, until her eye caught the object of which it was in search. She still entertained, however, the same hope, which she expressed soon after the operation, that when she got home, her knowledge of external things would be more accurate and intelligible, and that when she came to look at those objects which had been so long familiar to her touch, the confusion which the multiplicity of external objects now caused would in a great measure subside."

Thus, then, it is from an association between the senses that correctness and precision in any one sense are acquired; and especially do the eye and hand support each other, and supply each other's deficiencies till both have learned their perfect lesson. I can stretch my hand out to any object before me with certainty, so truly does the eye tell me whether it is within my reach or not, but the eye first learned that faculty from the hand, after long discipline and many trials. Afterwards the eye speaks a silent language to the hand, and is understood. Under what merciful circumstances are they placed that possess all their faculties and senses! but, alas! how many are there that never dream of thanking a merciful God for his unbounded kindness! nay, there are some atheistical materialists who believe, or rather pretend to believe, that man's exquisite organization, and that of animals and plants, is self-developed--how, they do not condescend to explain; for, granting them their premises, namely, that matter is eternal--and what then? it must be inert, and neither the laws of vitality nor chemistry, involving electricity and galvanism, could be taken on by inert particles--all would be chaotic, did not God govern, arrange, and order all. It is he who has created man, and, fallen as man is, he still is an object of God's care; for he sent his well-beloved Son into the world for our redemption, and the time is coming in which all nations shall know the Lord, and adore him in sincerity and truth.

Like all the organs of our senses, the hands are the instrument of wickedness to sinful man; his sense of touch is the inlet of evil. How refined that sense in the adroit pickpocket, but to what an ill purpose is it devoted! How dexterous are the hands of the shoplifter, but to what a wretched course have they been trained! The hand grasps the pen; every stroke is guided by its delicate sense of touch; it obeys the mind; and, oh! what dictations from the depraved mind have polluted society! God has been reviled, Jesus Christ denied, the Holy Spirit mocked, and in letters written by hands which the almighty Maker and Preserver had endowed so supereminently. Their hands are mouldering; dust has returned to dust; but where are the immortal spirits which directed those hands to scatter poison abroad? It is not for us to inquire or judge. Let us, ourselves, be watchful, and let our hands be clean in the sight of God; let us be diligent in business, serving the Lord; let us fight the good fight of faith, and lay hold on eternal life!

Though we have described the hand as the great and main organ of touch, let it be understood that it is not the first called into operation. The hand requires rigid discipline; for a long period it is useless as an organ of tact; yet, when educated, how perfect, how precise! But it is made what it is by education. Our ideas coincide exactly with those of sir Charles Bell, who thus writes: "The lips and the tongue are first exercised; the next motion is to put the hand to the mouth in order to suck it; and no sooner are the fingers capable of grasping, than whatever they hold is carried to the mouth; so that the sensibility to touch in the lips and tongue, and their motions, are the first inlets to knowledge, and the use of the hand is a later acquirement."

Another passage from the same gifted writer is as follows: "The first office of the hand, then, is to exercise the sensibility of the mouth; and the infant as certainly questions the reality of things by that test, as the dog does by its acute sense of smelling. In the infant, the sense of the lips and tongue is resigned only in favour of the sense of vision, when that sense has improved, and offers a greater gratification, and a better means of judging of the qualities of bodies. The hand very slowly acquires the sense of touch; and many ineffectual efforts are seen in the arms and fingers of the child, before the direction of objects or their distance is ascertained. Gradually the length of the arm, and the extent of its motions, become the measure of distance, of form, of relation, and perhaps of time."

Throughout life, the sensibility, as it regards tact, of the tongue and lips continues paramount; we can feel the slenderest hair with our tongue, which our hands would not appreciate: but, on the contrary, size, form, distance, order, and the general qualities of matter, can only be gained through the hand, after a persevering discipline. A blind man may examine a statue with his hands, and pronounce upon its excellence; and this fact suggests to us an idea of sir Charles Bell, who says: "The knowledge of external bodies, as distinguished from ourselves, cannot be acquired until the organs of touch in the hand have become familiar with our own limbs. We cannot be supposed capable of exploring anything by the motion of the hand, or of judging of the form or tangible qualities of an object pressed against the skin, before we have a knowledge of our own body as distinguished from things external to us." From these remarks we naturally slide into a dissertation on a sense, allied to that of touch, but yet different--we mean muscular sense.

6. _Muscular sense._--God in his infinite wisdom has constructed all living things, and no doubt there is much yet for the philosopher to discover in the organization of animal bodies; there is, moreover, something that he never will understand, namely, life intrinsically considered, and the manner in which the immortal spirit and the dying body communicate with and influence each other. But though these points must ever remain a mystery, still there are those the obscurity of which science has to a certain degree dispelled, and it was reserved for a late scientific anatomist to prove to the world, that the nerves of sensation and the nerves of motion are essentially distinct, although interblended together they pervade every muscle. Hence, as this philosopher observes, (we mean sir Charles Bell,) we are sensible of the action of our muscles, because these muscles have two classes of nerves; and he found that in exciting one of these the muscle contracted, while on exciting the other no action took place. The nerve which had no power to make the muscle contract was the nerve of sensation.

Continuing his experiments, he proved that there is a nervous circle connecting the muscles with the brain, that one nerve is not capable of transmitting what is called the nervous spirits in two different directions at one instant of time, but that for the regulation of muscular action there is a nerve of sensibility, to convey a sensation of the condition of the muscles to the sensorium, as well as a nerve of motion for conveying the mandate of the will to the muscles. He also demonstrated, that in their distribution through the body, the nerves which possess these two distinct powers of conveying sensation, and of exciting the muscles to contraction, are wrapped up, or, as it were, woven together in the same sheath, and that they present to the eye the single appearance of one nerve. It was only by examining the nerves at their roots, that is, where they arise from different tracts of the brain and spinal marrow, and before they coalesce, that this philosophic anatomist succeeded in demonstrating their distinct functions. In the face, the nerve of motion passes by a circuitous route, apart from the nerve of sensation, to be distributed to the muscles; and, therefore, the distinct characters of these two nerves were, as sir C. Bell asserts, more easily proved by experiment than in any other part of the body.

The nerves of sensation then feel, or rather recognise, those actions of the muscles which are excited through the medium of the nerves of contraction, and these nerves of contraction, as far as the voluntary muscles are concerned, obey the commands of an immaterial being--mind, spirit, soul; in the lower animals, so far as we know, this principle is transient, for they have no ideas of life, or of death, or of futurity; but in man, the soul is immortal, and for the future bliss of this immortal essence revelation affords a certain guide.

Now the sense of touch and the muscular sense have, by most writers, been confounded together; hence, we are told that weight is determined by touch, but this is erroneous; it is determined by the muscular agency and sense, under the dictation of the will. The abbé Nollet says of touch, that "it not only puts it in our power to judge of what makes an impression upon us, but also of what resists our impulsions." Here the sense of touch and the muscular sense are confounded together. The agency of touch has nothing to do with weight or resistance; and herein we differ from Dr. Fleming, and agree with sir Charles Bell, by whom, indeed, this muscular sense was first demonstrated. To feel, or touch, is not to resist or struggle. Laocoon, striving with the serpents, resists--his muscular sense is called into action, as is that of the wrestler when engaged in a trial of skill or strength; but what has muscular feeling to do with that tact, which distinguishes between the texture of tissues, or the smoothness or roughness of bodies? For ourselves, we refer the sensations of hardness and softness rather to a muscular sense than a simple sense of touch; but, as we have said, the sense of touch and the muscular sense, or sense of resistance, inter-amalgamate with each other, nevertheless, there is a definite muscular sense of which every one is conscious, and it is by the education of this sense that the infant learns to walk, the man to ascend the lofty ladder, or traverse the ledge of the precipice. It is not connected with feeling alone, but also with sight; and, indeed, the senses of sight, feeling and support, or resistance, are in as close relationship, as are those of smell and taste. This is exemplified in the fencer, whose muscular sense obeys his eye, and in the artist, who strikes out the bold outline of a figure on the canvass.

This muscular sense is sometimes called the sense of motion; and rightly, because it is a feeling of muscular action; not a feeling of extraneous bodies, but a feeling of what passes within ourselves, as far as such feeling is permitted (many internal operations go on without our consciousness)--a feeling of what we do, according to our will, and the permission of God Almighty. Does the uninstructed man, who looks upon and admires a lovely landscape, think about the inverted picture on his retina? No. Does the athlete who lifts a great weight think of the biceps, or the deltoid, or the pectoral muscles? No. But does he not feel, while he strives, while he struggles, while he runs, an internal consciousness of action totally distinct from touch?