Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1892-02-15
THE EFFECTS OF DOORS.
Striking Instances of the Permanence of
Smells on the Memory.

Striking Instances of the Permanence of
Smells on the Memory.
The direct action of odors on the nervous
centers is subject worthy of careful re.
search and study. Goethe had a strong
dislike to the odor " apples; Schiller liked
| the odor. Some people are made absolute
| ly i'll by the odor Of onions that are being
cooked, while other persons rather like it.
The odor of the lily has a most potent eff
| feet in many instances, and believe there
| is no person on whom it does not produce
| sense of depression and nausea. l have
known it cause positive faintness. l am
| myself always disagreeably affected by the
odor of carbolic acid, and can never remain
many minutes in a room where a trace of
| it prevails
In cases where the effect of an odor is
| instantaneous, it is fair to suppose that
the impression made on the olfactory sur
| face is transmitted direct to the olfactory
| center of the brain; but there must also, in
| certain examples, be a further transmits
| sion to the sympathetic ganglia. The cen
trail seat of the olfactory sense must be
very near to the central seat of memory
| for it is noticeable that nothing recalls n
| past event like an odor
little child was accidentally thrown
out of pony carriage in a country lane
Near the spot where the fall took place
| there was manure heap, which gave
| forth the peculiar dry ammoniacal odor so
| often recognizable from such heaps-an
door distinctive, yet not altogether IN
pleasant. The child was stunned by the
| tall, and on recovering and returning to
| consciousness smelt this door powerfully
Over fifty years have elapsed since that
| little mishap, and yet whenever the person
| referred to passes in country lanes heap
| giving out the same odor, the whole scene
OF the accident recurs with every detail
| perfect, and sometimes with a recurrence
| of the giddiness and nausea which were
experienced at the moment. In some of
the lower animals memory by odors is
often singularly exhibited. In the dog the
| memory by odor seems a special part of
the nature of the animal The scent" of
the fox hound and of the stag hound is of
this character In the trained collie the
remembrance of an object hidden, a stick,
for instance, may be retained for three
quarters of an hour so perfectly that the
animal will fetch the object at command
| But if the object be coated with something
| giving an odor which the animal is fami-
liar with the time is infinitely more pro
| longed
| Some odors lead to sleep, like the odor
| from dried hops; others lead to wakeful-
ness, like the odor of dead flowers or leaves.
Still others allow sleep. but provoke the
most terrible dreams, like the odors arts
ing from pillow in which feathers are de
composing. Habit modifes the effects of
| odor Merciless smokers laugh at the
''faddery'' of women who become faint il
a smoker charges the air they breathe in a
confined space, a small room or a railway
| carriage, and are ready 70 compare the OBJ
| lection Of lady GnaccuStomed to the odor
| from the pipe or cigar with the careless.
ness on the matter shown by another lady,
who has become accustomed to the effect
| But if a smoker gives up smoking and all
contact with smoke for few years, he is
! astounded at the unpleaSantness of an all
charged with smoke when he is then in
closed IN it.
WAS once summoned professionally to q
youth who was temporarily poisoned by
| inhaling the atmosphere issuing out of q
| small window of clubroom in which a
number of men were smoking freely They
in the body Of the smoke, were not percep
tibly affected. He, partly in the open air
was positively smitten TO faintness by the
empoisoned current from the room, which
flowed out of the window, and is still af
fected whenever he comes within the cloud
of pipe.-Dr B. NJ. Richardson in Ascle
| Mad