The Five Senses; Or, Gateways to Knowledge (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1860 edition. Excerpt: ... m. THE NOSE. The Organ of Smell "we are apt to regard more as an ornamental than a useful appendage to our faces. So useless, indeed, do a large portion of mankind esteem it to be, that they have converted it into a snuffbox: it was given us, however, for a different purpose. It is a much simpler construction in all respects than the eye or the ear; and as it stands closely related to the necessities of animal life, it is more largely developed in the lower creatures, such as the dog, who hunt their prey by the scent, than it is in ourselves. But we are largely endowed with an organ of smell also; and besides its practical importance as a minister of the body, it has a close relation to our emotional nature, and therefore an sesthetical aspect which will be noticed in the sequel. Its construction may be explained in a word. A glance at the cleft head of a dog or a sheep will show that the nostril opens into a large arched cavity, with many curled partitions partially dividing it into additional spaces. The walls and arch of this cavity are constructed of bone, and lined with a soft, moist, velvety membrane, resembling that inside the mouth. Over this membrane spread a multitude of small threads or nerves resembling the twigs of a branch; there are many such branches within the nostril, and they join together so as to form larger branches, which may be compared to the boughs yf a tree. These finally terminate in a number of stems, or trunks, several for each nostril, which pass upwards through apertures provided for them in the roof of the arched cavity, and terminate in the brain. We have thus, as it were, a leafless nervetree whose roots are in the brain, and whose boughs, branches, and twigs spread over the lining membrane of the nostril. This...