The copper country evening news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 18??-1907, 1897-10-07
EYES, EARS AND NOSES.
Sight, Hearing and Smell In the Ages
Long Ago and Now.


Long Ago and Now.
1t is very curious question, especially
If the question include the first animals
created us well as the first men, whether
there be any difference between sight.
hearing and smell in those early days and
at the present time.
Smell was one of the most important
senses then, for il aroused appetite en-
ablod the animals to seek and find their
mates and TO track their prey and it gave
them warning of foes approach or pres
ence. With man now it is of only third
rate or fourth rate Importance
The organ of smell among some of the
first creatures was not near the end of the
snout or nose, but near the brain, and was
well padded or cushioned with fat and pro-
tected by tender skin or by scales over
tapping each othor
But it was not more keen or more deli
cate then than it is now, especially in our
hunting dogs. Cats, too-and these are
among the later animals--have this sense
in great perfection. A cat has what is
called the homing instinct, and if carried
away from home in the dark it can return
by precisely the same road. 1t is said that
this is because every field, ditch, village
or house leaves its own odor in just the
right order on the cats brain, like sue
cession of pictures, and the animal smells
its way back as we would see ours.
The organ of smell seems to communi-
cate with the memory, for the scent of "a
flower will sometimes bring back TO a
grown man the scene associated with it in
his childhood, and thousand other sub
tie thoughts and feelings, so that he seems
literally carried back into his past life
The first creatures knew nothing of fra
GRANGE The sweet smelling flowers were
not then in existence. Besides, their
brains were too small to enjoy the delicate
pleasures of sweet odors.
Hearing was comparatively poor with
the first animals, for often an external ear
was lacking. The outside ear not only
protects the delicate nerves within, like a
hood but also gathers or collects sounds.
A man of defective hearing instinctively
puts his hand behind his ear for this pur-
pose. Birds that have no external ear can
easily be surprised by night and taken,
while their acute vision shows them every
movement by day.
The savage races had little idea of music
They liked noises as children like drums
and horns. The savages on the Midway
plaisance had great delight in their native
music which was disoord TO our ears 1t
required larger brains and finer training
to have the full delight in melody and har-
mony that our musicians possess now.
Tho eye, also, in the gigantic creatures Of
early periods was sometimes rudimentary,
though, again, it was of large size and pro-
tected by IA ring of bony plates instead of
the lovely silken eyelashes that protect and
adorn the human eye now. In some of
those lizardlike animals that burrowed in
the mud there were three pairs of eyelids,
one of them transparent, SO that the ami
nal might see through it closed.
1t is said that early writers, like Homer,
speak of very few colors, chiefly red, or
"purple," as they called it then.
Enjoyment of beauty, of graceful curves
and lines and proportion, or of harmonious
and varied colors and their delicate tints
belongs to a later state of cultivation, "A
more developed brain, than most of the
early races knew.-E +. Mosby in Phila-
delphia Times.