Also, by means of the more or less numerous pores which cover it,
it becomes impregnated with the sapid and soluble portions of the
bodies which it is placed in contact with. Yet all this does not
suffice, for many adjacent parts unite in completing the sensation
--viz: jaws, palate, and especially the nasal tube, to which
physiologists have perhaps not paid attention enough.

The jaws furnish saliva, as necessary to mastication as to the
formation of the digestible mass. They, like the palate, are
gifted with a portion of the appreciative faculties; I do not know
that, in certain cases, the nose does not participate, and if but
for the odor which is felt in the back of the mouth, the sensation
of taste would not be obtuse and imperfect.

Persons who have no tongue or who have lost it, yet preserve the
sensation of taste. All the books mention the first case; the
second was explained to me by an unfortunate man, whose tongue had
been cut out by the Algerines for having, with several of his
companions, formed a plot to escape from captivity.

I met this man at Amsterdam, where he was a kind of broker. He was
a person of education, and by writing was perfectly able to make
himself understood.

Observing that his whole tongue, to the very attachment, had been
cut away, I asked him if he yet preserved any sense of taste when
he ate, and if the sense of taste had survived the cruel operation
he had undergone.

He told me his greatest annoyance was in swallowing, (which indeed